Conor Stechschulte

Investigate visual storytelling strategies through the contemporary art forms of alternative comics and graphic novels. This course introduces a variety of illustrative approaches, such as writing, storyboarding, penciling, inking/coloring, and prepress preparations with a diverse exploration of materials including pencil, pen, ink, and collage. Building on this foundation, students learn research methods to develop ideas and produce conceptually-driven, portfolio-quality works through projects that examine narrative structures, material choices, and the integration of text and image. Students are introduced to contemporary artists, illustrators, and designers that transcend the traditional approaches of comics and graphic novels to generate their own audiences. Regular critiques and field trips to the Art Institute of Chicago, Museum of Contemporary Art, and/or local galleries and comic shops supplement the studio experience. *NOTE* Previous drawing experience required. SAIC provides basic equipment, but students are encouraged to bring their own digital camera, tablet, and/or laptop for homework and after-studio hours projects.

How is print fundamental to artistic practice? Students will have two seven-week sections learning fundamentals, exploring ways in which artists utilize processes to facilitate print media based projects. Projects will encourage students to critically examine how print services concept and context both historically and within the contemporary. Each thematic section is anchored in a specific print process aimed to establish skill acquisition and experimentation. Sections in Room 221 and 222 will concentrate on experimental and innovative processes in Screenprinting and Lithography; the section meeting in Room 223 will explore contemporary practices using Relief, etching, monotypes, stencils, and collagraphs. Faculty will conduct process demonstrations, introduce students to a history of practitioners in the graphic arts, and provide supporting readings. Print processes covered may include screen printing, relief, monotypes, photo plate lithography, book arts. Topics will vary but may include the multiple, seriality, editions, public address, progression of collage, and self-publishing. Learning will be aided with visits to the AIC Department of Prints and Drawings and the Joan Flasch Artists Books Collection

This course will look at the inseparable link between comic stories and how they are reproduced. In the first half of the semester, we will gain familiarity with screenprint and risograph printing techniques, look at historical and contemporary examples of how artists employ print technology to tell stories and do in-class exercises. In the second half, students will produce their own printed comics and discuss them in group critiques.

In the last twenty years, the Risograph machine has become a powerful tool in the hands of artists and self-publishers. Students in this course will learn advanced methods of printing, spot color layering and color-separation along with becoming immersed in the rich global culture of RIsograph printing and publishing. The class will consist of demonstrations, lectures and presentations on current Risograph practitioners, visits with artists and publishers, trips to school collections and the prodigious production of strange and beautiful printed objects. Lectures and readings may include the work of artists Sigrid Calon, Lale Westvind, Joe Kessler, and the publishers Colorama, Perfectly Acceptable, Colour Code, The Charles Nypels Lab, Animal Press, Tan and Loose, and others. Students will be expected to produce 3-4 projects demonstrating technical proficiency and contextual grounding. These projects will be refined during regular one-on-one meetings and discussed in three group critiques. The course will culminate in a show of student work.