Amy Newell

medium: mixed media
wisconsin academy gallery artist, 2002

Click on the image to see the full version.

Token en Passant (June 8) 2002 Graphic art	Token en Passant (June 9) 2002 Graphic art	Token en Passant (May Picnic) 2002 Graphic art
Slumberer's Sightseeing 2000 Graphic art	Slumberer's Sightseeing 2000 Graphic art	Souvenirs, Austria 2002 Mixed media
Souvenirs, Netherlands 2002 Mixed media	Souvenirs, France 2002 Mixed media	Launching: Body & Mind 2000 Graphic art
Launching: Body & Mind 2000 Graphic art

Contact information
1420 Williamson St
Madison, WI 53703
Email Address: amy@rigamarolepress.com
Web site: www.rigamarolepress.net

Artist statement
In general, I think of my work as an attempt to catalogue my life. I treat the art as a visual journal. My images are autobiographical and the concepts come from my memories (both old and new) of events and happenings that make up who I am. Sometimes the images evolve around a specific personal event, meeting or conversation. Other times the ideas are more about memory and communication in a general, universal way.

I have a tendency towards objects with a history. I am seduced by a worked, worn surface. I am drawn to matter with a high survival factor. Often in my work I go through a process of remove and replace and remove and return and replace, continuing until in some unexplainable way the work tells me it is done. I build my images both literally and figuratively. They begin with ideas of personal and/or communal recollections; these are their springboards. But inevitably there comes a point in each piece where the conceptual takes a back seat to the formal. My eye and hand take over and issues of color and composition become most important. It is not so important to me that the viewer is able to decipher my cryptic code and arrive at some hidden message; I am not sure one exists. What's important is that they stay and look, peeling away each layer and delving under the surface.

Biography
Amy Newell was born in Starkville, Mississippi, in 1971. Her first two years of college were spent in her hometown at Mississippi State University. In 1991 she transferred to Virginia Commonwealth University. There she completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts with an emphasis in painting and printmaking in December of 1993. In the fall of 1996, Newell was accepted into the graduate program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She was admitted to the graphics program where she studied printmaking until May of 1999, when she completed her MFA.

Newell currently works for Tandem Press, where she is the Associate Curator. There she assists in the production and sales of prints by artists such as Judy Pfaff, Suzanne Caporael, Robert Cottingham, David Lynch, Art Spiegelman, Robert Stackhouse, Gronk and Donald Baechler. During the summer of 2001, Newell, along with two other women printmakers, Liz Roth and Max White, started 3 Alarm Press, a letterpress and etching studio on the east side of Madison, Wisconsin.

Newell's body of work includes drawings, etching, letterpress and relief prints as well as collage, assemblage and artist books. Her imagery typically consists of everyday objects and natural elements, juxtaposed to one another or overlapping each other, in a somewhat shallow space. Text is often used, as well as photocopy transfers and rubber stamps. Her work has been exhibited in print shows around the country, most recently at the Center for The Book Arts in New York City, The Wisconsin Academy in Madison, and the Southern Graphics Council in New Orleans. Her prints have been included in permanent collections such as The University of Dallas and Emory and Henry College.