I promise I did see this in person, but all the pictures I took had a glare!
I promise I did see this in person, but all the pictures I took had a glare! JK
The works in Seattle-based printmaker Kim Van Someren's latest show The Slant of Line at J.Rinehart Gallery resemble tilted, abstracted structures or machines that need to be attended to. Some look like places you worship in, others like abandoned wooden buildings you might see out in a dusty field. And while her work is steeped in the rural—reflecting the Wisconsin farms Van Someren grew up on —pieces like "Shuffler" seem urban, a skyscraper and the long shadow it casts in the late afternoon sun. "Shuffler" is part of a series of collaged prints Van Someren created while in quarantine.

She used a carbon printing technique, pressing a thin needle on carbon paper to create the delicate and imprecise lines that are crammed in next to each other, without any preconceived ideas about how they should look. This results in structures that grew organically, containing spaces that are dense with pigment balanced with spaces that are light and airy. And if you check out the works in person, you can see the delicate layers of tissue underneath the black lines. JRG has a lot of online content connected to the show, from an hour-long "virtual opening" with the artist to a digitized exhibition catalog featuring an essay, "Transformative Machines," by scholar and writer Sharon Arnold that carefully considers Van Someren's work. When viewing the prints myself this week, I found them to be quiet and meditative places to step into.

Kim Van Someren's The Slant of Line is up at J. Rinehart Gallery until September 12—don't miss it!