Ted Ramsay, The Paper Trail: An Artist’s Journey

With each show at WSG, you can find images of the artist’s work and his or her artist’s statement on our website.  Here on the blog, I try to ask some deeper questions about the artist’s creative process, methods of working and the journey to the current body of work.  Below, you’ll find some questions regarding Ted Ramsay’s new show and his responses.

Sky Totem, pigmented hand-made rag paper pulp, 42 x 31 x 3″

Q: Aside from working with color, composition, rhythm and pattern – some of our art practices – the physical process of working in paper pulp is much different than painting.  What did you find were the most interesting problem solving opportunities you encountered working with paper?

Ted: I approached paper as a fluid sculptural material with color. The subject often suggested how I would approach the making process.  Most pieces were based on my experience hiking through Chaco Canyon.  The sunlight falling on the clay  and cliffs was very similar to the way color and light hit the paper.  The pieces aren’t a copy of the Canyons, rather an interpretation.  The relief of the pieces echoes the rock surfaces.

Lyrical Relief :

pigmented handmade rag paper :

29″h x 28″w x 2″d

Q:  How was it that adding paper-making and art-making with paper, rather than just paper as a substrate, affected your painting?

Ted: I think the painting affected the paper making.  Creating value systems for paintings, creating objects through the way light reflected off of them with paint, really influenced the paper making.  When I paint, I paint the light reflecting off of the object, rather than the object itself.

Portal 1 :

cast handmade rag paper,

one casting made from mold :

26″h x 32″ w x 2″ d

Q:  Tell me about the paper art movement – how it came into your sight-line.

Ted: Purely by accidental means!  The factory where I had been working on epoxy and polyester cast pieces burned down.  I was visiting New York at the time and as I walked through SOHO, I saw a poster at an alley entrance advertising the “Institute for Experimental Printmaking” in Santa Cruz, CA.  Garner Tallis was running it at the time and I had the opportunity to learn more about the paper casting process.  We worked with paper making processes and learning more about the mould-making process over the 2-week workshop.  (Moulds are an important part of making multiple paper pieces and they also help the pulp hold its form until it is dry and can be manipulated easier in sculptural pieces.)  The more I worked with paper as an art medium, the more possibilities I saw.

Song of the West :

pigmented handmade paper relief :

31″h x 31″ w

Ted Ramsay’s show runs June 16 – July 25, 2015.  Join us at the reception and meet the artist Friday, June 19, 7-9pm.