It's When the Seasons Change that all Things Really Become Themselves and Try on New Clothes and Possibly Present the Versions Never Seen Before or Again (Paul Wackers)

This Paul Wackers (b.1978, lives and works in NYC @hibbledygibldy on IG) silkscreen was created at Du-Good Press, in Brooklyn, with founder Leslie Diuguid. If it doesn’t knock your socks off, you might actually be dead. Check your pulse, then tap through to Du-Good’s site to see it in detail, zoom in to ponder how the inks layer on top of each other (!!!), and hop over to IG for some making-of footage.

This is an 11-color print, which means that eleven different screens were made — one for each color — and eleven layers of ink collide and fuse, creating even more hues. Understanding how all of these layers work together is part of the magic of printmaking. Making sure they all line up as planned is the science. The more screens, the more complex the image, and the more opportunities for mistakes. Pulling this beauty off was no small feat.

Wackers is known for assembling ordinary objects — lots of books, rocks, and plants — that take on a life of their own. These familiar objects start to look unfamiliar because Wackers paints them from a slightly different angle, making them more flat, in some cases, and in others, using different mediums, like ink and spray paint, to layer in texture that gives the objects a different kind of energy (much like his prints!).

For more about his work, this interview in Sight Unseen is an oldie but goodie.