February 2023 Newsletter
/The time has come!
Tropic Bound Artists’ Book Fair has arrived in Miami’s Design District. Book people: there is not a minute to spare. We are so excited to see you here, and so ready to show you what all of this work has amounted to.
This Thursday, February 16th, we kick everything off at 10AM with two fantastic shuttle tours exploring Miami’s literary arts scene, followed by the Symposium from 4-6PM, followed by the fair’s Welcome Party! All of the Thursday events require you to register via Eventbrite, so click through if you are reading this over your morning cup of coffee and trying to plan your day.
From February 17th through 19th, you can expect to find artists’ books from all over the world, in the loving care of some of the most committed champions of artists’ book out there. Artists, dealers, publishers, and more will be sitting at every table with a thoughtful selection of books that they love, showing them off, selling them, and in many cases, encouraging you to touch the art. IS Projects will have a table, of course, so be sure to swing by and say hello!
The Tropic Bound team has worked incredibly hard to bring this thing to life. We are all so ridiculously excited to share this experience and all of this wonderful work in this city. Come see it for yourself.
Visit TropiC Bound’s website at tropicboundfair.org for more information
So many exciting things have been made here in the last month, but this (literally) Medieval paper drying system is proof that we’re starting to (literally) get our feet wet with papermaking in the new space. Keep an eye out — we’ll get our papermaking facilities up and running before you know it!
Member March
The only problem we have with our membership program right now is that it isn’t big enough. We are having a fantastic time working with our current studio members on all of the things they want to make, and we want more! We want more people to sign up for memberships, and we want our members to come in and print more often. In an effort to motivate more art making via carrot (as opposed to stick), we have decided to declare March to be Member March: a month-long membership drive which will include sweet deals and cool prizes!
For the sake of having as much fun as possible, we will be announcing all of the Member March offerings at the very beginning of March. Keep an eye out!
That said, there are two great reasons to join now: The deadline to apply for our first annual IS Projects Portfolio Exchange is February 28th, and if you are don’t fall into one of the invited artists categories outline on our website, then you’ll have to become a studio member to apply! Additionally, our quarterly members-only Shop Talk is coming up on March 3rd, and it’s a great opportunity to meet other folks who make their art here and get real excited about all the parts of prints and books that keep you excited to make them.
SGCI is coming to IS Projects!
Yeah, no big deal. We’re hosting an SGCI satellite event in March. Totally casual. It’s just the largest organization of printmakers in the nation. The annual conference will be held remotely this year, but there are in-person satellite events nation wide, and IS Projects is the place to be if you want to sling some ink in the state of Florida with the SGCI folks! We are so honored to have this opportunity, and absolutely cannot wait to share all of the wild things that this “carnival of ink” will entail. You will really just have to see this for yourself.
A big thank you to Joseph Velazquez for pulling this all together.
Workshops and Open Studios for February and March!
There’s not much left of February, but we’re moving into spring with some energy. You can take Charlisa Montrope’s weekend intensive in Watercolor Monotype on February 24th and 25th. March brings two great opportunities to jump right into the deep end with Ingrid: You can take her beloved weekend Screen Printing Intensive, which starts Friday, March 24th, or if you have an idea for a print project that you just need a little more support to execute, you might check out her four week, once a week Advanced Printmaking course. There’s only one more Print Club day on the calendar right now (though you can expect a fresh workshop drop in March!), and it’s Simple Bindings with Sammi McLean. Print Club members get a 50% discount on the Print Club days. Lastly, If you want to learn a whole lot about color, come in for Brooke Frank’s three hour color crash course Color Mixing for Pritnmakers. It’s going to be real geeky in the best way.
