It was a fairly large show and very fun to hang (and hang with her again)!  Rebecca organized the images in an interesting way — boys on one side, girls on the other!  It made a whacky sort of sense to me!

When I arrived for the opening, Rebecca had arranged for Camille Dautrich (writer for Springfield’s News Leader paper) to interview me which was pretty fun, though I’m no expert at that sort of thing.  Then I presented an hour-long lecture copiously illustrated with slides and video and THAT was a blast!  Maybe 30 faculty and students were present, they had lots of interesting questions and comments, and I felt it had all gone very well.  Several arts faculty took us to a great dinner (Linda and my daughter, Allegra, were with me) and, exhausted and a little drunk, I slept most of the way home while Linda drove.  Very satisfying event!

Here’s a short video walk-through of the exhibition:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVTWyU4pgXQ

North installation view (photo: Rebecca Miller)

East installation view (photo: Rebecca Miller)

North-East installation view (photo: Rebecca Miller)

South installation view (photo: Rebecca Miller)

hour-long slide and video lecture was well received - audience seemed especially to love the many short videos of work in process. (photo: Rebecca Miller)

Drury University

The Department of Art & Art History and the Pool Art Center Gallery

Paintings, Drawings, and Prints: MIKE LYON

Pool Art Center Gallery

940 N. Clay Avenue
Springfield, MO  65802
417-873-7263
www.drury.edu/pacgallery

March 5-26, 2010 viewing hours: Monday – Friday, 8am – 5pm and Thursday 8am – 8pm

Artist Talk Friday, March 5, 6-7pm

Opening Reception Friday, March 5, 6-9pm

This review appeared in the Springfield News Leader:

NEWS-LEADER. News-Leader.com Tuesday, March 16, 2010 78

Artist creates through computer programs

by Camille DAUTRlCH

It’s complicated.

No, I’m not changing disciplines and reviewing Meryl Streep’s recent movie. I’m talking about the process by which Kansas City artist Mike Lyon creates his monumental works of art, now on display at Drury’s Pool Art Center.

Armed with a knowledge of centuries- old printmaking techniques as well as a mastery of how to write contemporary computer programs, Lyon uses his brains, rather than his hands, to create his art. The results, a qmple dozen of which are packed into Drury’s gallery, are fascinating. The more you look, the more you see.

Occasionally, people give him a hard time about the way he makes art, Lyon said, claiming it’s the computer, not him, that’s responsible for the finished product. He begs to differ, however.

“I spend months figuring out the codes for my works,” he said, adding that every movement of the pen or airbrush is an X-Y coordinate. “I write programs that write programs.”

Lyon’s facility with computers came early. With a college degree in architecture from the University of Pennsylvania, he went to work for his family’s cattle- hide processing business in Kansas City in 1976. While there, he developed a computerized system to facilitate the grading of hides.

That idea took off in a big way, and Lyon was able to sell his invention and go to work full time as an artist.

Dautrich/Exhibit should appeal to artistic, analytical

In addition to his architecture degree, Lyon earned a BFA in painting from the Kansas City Art Institute, and before he made art on the computer, he made it like everybody else.

“When I was a student, I stood at an easel and painted what I saw,” he said, “and I did it well.”

Talking to Lyon, however, it’s clear he’s too precise a thinker to spend his days with a brush in hand. Writing computer programs to make prints, drawings and paintings was the logical next step.

Still, history plays a role. He’s heavily influenced by Japanese woodblock prints, as well as by the 17th century French engraver Claude Mellan.

It was Mellan’s “Sudarium of Jesus” that inspired Lyon’s pen-and-ink work of his wife, Linda, a huge portrait created out of spiraling squares that begin at the center of Linda’s nose. Get up close to the work, and it’s a series of incredibly-detailed squares, but back up, and Linda’s face, more than six feet tall, comes immediately into view.

Portraiture, especially faces, makes up the majority of this exhibit, although there are several full-length representations, a couple of landscapes, and a stunning back view of a nude that’s front and center when you enter the gallery. Lyon’s parents, his wife, his son and several self-portraits are all included in the show.

Viewers will no doubt make comparisons to the work of Chuck Close when seeing these paintings and prints, but there is a difference. Lyon has his own agenda and his own techniques, although the largehead format is similar to that of Close.

This exhibit should appeal to both the artistic and the analytical mind, and Lyon believes that he has found a way to combine scientific understanding with aesthetics.

“I don’t know how to describe how I feel,” he said, “but I do feel. Also, I like figuring stuff out.”

The exhibit continues through March 26 at Drury University’S Pool Art Center, 940 N. Clay Avenue. Gallery hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday, and 8 a.m.-8 p.m. Thursday.

For more information, call 873-7263.

Camille Dautrich reviews the arts for the News-Leader.

PRINT QUARTERLY, XXVI, 2009, 4, Page 409

NOTES

MIKE LYON. For various reasons, very modest exhibition catalogues are sometimes worth noting in Print Quarterly. This is the case with Figuring it Out: Prints and Drawings by Mike Lyon (Manhattan, KS, Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art, Kansas State University, 2009, 8 pp., 10 col. ills., free), which includes an essay by Bill North. For this photorealist printmaker has made use of his knowledge of computerized technology to create a series of digitally based colour woodcuts. Mike Lyon studied at the University of Pennsylvania and the Kansas City Art Institute before going to work in [976 in his family’s cattle-hide processing business. There he invented a computerized system to automate the process of grading cattle hides. This led him to set up a successful computer hardware and software design business, which specialized in providing warehouses with a computerized system for automating orders. In 1991 Lyon sold the company and became a full-time artist. A great admirer of Japanese aesthetics and printmaking and an avid collector of ukiyo-e prints, he taught Japanese woodblock techniques at the Center for Contemporary Printmaking in Norwalk, Connecticut. He based the designs for his own woodcuts on photographs. Lyon used Prussian Blue ink similar to that used in aizuri-e woodcuts and followed Japanese methods in printing. Rather than printing from multiple blocks, however, he used a single block, reprinting it to achieve the results that he desired by the reduction woodcut method.

In 2004 Lyon decided to use his knowledge of computers to further his art, acquiring a ShopBot CNC (computer numerically controlled router) designed for woodworking applications. As North describes, he adapted the machine to carve his blocks. The first woodcut that Lyon printed using the ShopBot was carved from fifteen separate cherry plywood blocks, although he maintained his approach to the work conceptually as a reduction woodcut. This print of a full frontal head close to the picture plane bears similarity to some of the works of Chuck Close. More recently Lyon has created a large-scale print of a reclining nude, using paper especially made for him by Iwano Ichibei. To print it, he designed and made his own printing press with a five-by-ten feet bed, and adapted the elements of an electric garage door to act as a drawer, which cantilevers over the bed laying the paper on the block as the drawer retracts. Lyon has also used the machine to create immense photographically based pen and ink drawings.

The exhibition also included eighteen Japanese woodblock prints from the artist’s own collection. Dating from between c. 1767 and 1928, these were chiefly of actors and beautiful women, the two illustrated in the catalogue being expressive close-up facial portraits. Cori Sherman North provides a brief description of ukiyo-e prints to accompany them. MARTIN HOPKINSON

The emotion in Mike Lyon’s artwork is inspired by old Japanese prints. The shapes are determined by the contours of the faces of his closest friends, friendly strangers, and the outcome hinges on the mechanics of his latest digital tools.

“Figuring it out: Prints and drawings by Mike Lyon” is on display until July 18 at the Beach Museum of Art.

Bill North, senior curator at the museum, said though Lyon has always had an artist’s touch and studied art in college, he got his start when he went to work in Kansas City, Mo., for his family’s cattle hide processing business in 1976. While working there, Lyon invented a computerized system that made it faster and easier for the workers grading cattle hides. His idea was wildly successful, and Lyon was able to sell his new machine and go to work as an artist full time.

This type of automation and machinery play a large role in Lyon’s work, along with a taste for Japanese print work, North said. Lyon has a collection of nearly 2,000 Japanese prints.

“One thing that really attracted me to his work is that few artists are using digital technology in a responsible and judicious way,” North said. “This marriage of Western and Eastern traditions and ways is so fascinating.”

At the entrance to Lyon’s gallery at the Beach Museum, five oversized faces stare out, full of ambiguous emotion, each wrinkle and hair clearly defined in a maze of ink squiggles and geometric shapes.

Lyon said he starts his process by having the model for each piece come in to his Kansas City studio, where he takes hundreds of photos of their face. He then spends several weeks painstakingly selecting the perfect photo to turn into a print piece.

“Most people don’t look like art,” he said. “But the right image — I know it when I see it, it’s just the aesthetics, I can’t explain it.”

He then programs a machine called the ShopBot with data converted from the digital photographic files to trace the image with a simple ink pen. The files tell the machine how far to move the pen along X, Y and Z axes for each bit of the piece. Lyon said this process is long and tedious and requires him to watch the machine to replace the pens when they run out and make sure the thick paper he prints on stays in place.

Lyon said he has been criticized for using technology so prominently in his work, but he feels that it takes just as much artistry to create his own computer programs and machines to make his pieces come to life.

“My ideas and my blocks and my shapes and my designs are not done by a computer,” Lyon said. “That comes from me, from my mind, and then I just make it happen, whether it’s my hand on the pen or my machine — just another tool.”

“Linda,” a featured piece in the gallery, is one Lyon printed of his wife, Linda Lyon. According to research compiled by North, this piece is 77-by-46 inches and took more than 12 million lines of code and 11 days of continuous drawing on the ShopBot.

Linda said she enjoyed posing for Mike because it gave her a chance to see him work.

“I never know how he is going to do something!” Linda said, laughing. “Every piece just turns out to be his own blend of the thoughts in his head.”

Video walk-through of exhibition

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27jBIlBDtfg

from the Beach Museum of Art web site:

Figuring it Out: Prints and Drawings by Mike Lyon

April 14, 2009 – July 18, 2009

Donna Lindsey Vanier Gallery

Kansas City-based artist Mike Lyon is the 2009 Friends of the Beach Museum of Art gift print artist. This exhibition features a selection of the artist’s recent prints and drawings, as well as examples from his extensive collection of Japanese prints. Lyon earned a BA in architecture and fine art (University of Pennsylvania, 1973) and a BFA in painting (Kansas City Art Institute, 1975). In 1976 he put his career as an artist on hold and joined the family business, a cattle hide processing operation in Kansas City his great-great grandfather started. Lyon invented a computerized system to automate the cattle hide grading process. In 1978 he founded Grading Systems, a computer hardware and software design company. Longing to make art full-time, Lyon sold his business interests and returned to his studio in 1991.

Lyon’s interest in computers and machines informs much of his recent work as a visual artist. His large-scale prints and drawings (as large as 84 × 45 inches) are based on his digital photographs of the human figure and inventively merge traditional art making methods and computer technology. Lyon’s work also demonstrates his keen interest in Japanese aesthetics. For example, his bust-length portrait heads recall the tradition of okubi-e (big-head picture) images. Lyon has an abiding passion for Japanese art and culture and is an avid collector of Japanese ukiyo-e prints.

Lyon’s prints and drawings are created with the aid of a ShopBot CNC (computer numerically controlled) router, a programmable machine designed for woodworking applications. He has modified the ShopBot to create a giant drawing and block cutting machine. With data from the digital photographs, he calculates millions of lines of movement code with which to program the ShopBot. This code instructs the machine how far to move an ink pen or a router bit along the X (length), Y (width), and Z (height) axes for each mark or cut. The final images can require as many as 12 million lines of code and nearly two weeks of non-stop drawing or cutting.

“Figuring it Out” is sponsored by the Friends of the Beach Museum of Art Business Partners.

Cover of catalog from the Beach Museum 2009 exhibition

distorted panorama of exhibition

sign at front door advertising the gallery-talk

Linda with "Annette" and "Linda"

Crosby and Anthony drawings - senior curator Bill North at right

Printmaking with Extreme Technology (Erik Brunvand, Chair with Edward Bateman, Stephen Hoskins, and Mike Lyon) 10-11:30am Friday, March 27 at Columbia College, Hokin Lecture Hall, 623 S. Wabash Ave, room 109

Printmaking is an art form that celebrates and embraces new technology in a way that other media do not. This panel gathers an international group of artists that are using extreme technology to make works that can only be called prints, but that are far removed from traditional printmaking techniques. These techniques include printing on silicon chips with image sizes measured in micrometers (millionths of meters), prints that include LEDs and other electrical components, 3D printing where the result is a solid object, the use of 3D computer modeling tools to create virtual worlds that are then printed digitally, and a wide variety of ways to use CNC routing in the printmaking process.

(l-r) Erik Brunvand, Steve Hoskins, Ed Bateman

The auditorium begins to fill 20 minutes prior to our talk - once underway, every seat was filled and people were in the aisles along both walls.

There were 120 – 140 in the audience when Erik introduced our panel and we got underway.

Ed Bateman is an assistant professor of art at the University of Utah and a working artist.  He described 3D modeling, adding skins with texture and color to wireframes, ray tracing, and sometimes days-long output to printing equipment.

Stephen Hoskins is the Hewlett Packard Professor of Fine Print and Director of the Centre for Fine Print Research at the University of the West of England in Bristol, UK and Vice-President of the Royal Society of Painter Printmakers.  Steve talked about his work in rapid prototyping with binder and powders (including firable ceramic powders ‘printed’ on his equipment), and showed some colorful nested models he’s produced.

Erik Brunvand is Associate Professor in the School of Computing at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah.  He teaches chip design and described the process of printing transistors and capacitors in layers on silicon wafers.  He showed some of the colorful images he’s ‘printed’ microscopically in empty areas of some of the  micro-chips he designs.

Our talks seemed to be enthusiastically received and there was time for 30 minutes of questions and answers.  VERY FUN!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtjGGkCWwlQ

panorama of Backstage Pass at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City

“Sarah” April 5, 2006, 7 x 3.75 feet, pen and ink drawing, Permanent Collection, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art

“Arthur”, Oct 31, 2006, 77 x 42.5 inches, pen and ink on Rives BFK paper, private collection

Mike Sims of Lawrence Lithography Workshop with 'Arthur' -- future collaborater

Exhibition catalog cover

Roger Shimomura, Chuck Close inside catalog

By pairing artworks from area private collections with examples by the same artists represented in the Kemper Museum’s permanent collection, this exhibition offers visitors a rare opportunity to see outstanding paintings, photographs, and sculptures by internationally acclaimed artists, including Willem de Kooning, Duane Hanson, Deborah Butterfield, Helen Frankenthaler, Lezley Saar, and Mike Lyon, among others, normally housed in private homes and offices. The diversity and quality of the featured works are not only a testament to Kansas City’s rich history of supporting the visual arts through public and private patronage, but also proof to the thriving support and enthusiasm for the arts in the city today.

Backstage Pass showcases noteworthy paintings by prominent American artists Richard Estes, Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, and Frank Stella, highlighting the level of commitment and intensity shared by many area collectors.

Equally important are the collections that include works by artists that reside in the Kansas City area, such as Wilbur Niewad, Roger Shrmomura, and Michael Sincair. Portraits by Andy Warhol and Kansas City-based Mike Lyon illustrate the gratifying relationship that often develops between artist and patron-arguably one of the most enjoyable facets of championing living artists.

Rachael Blackburn Cozad, Director
Christopher Cook, Curator
Backstage Pass exhibition catalog

Wow! What a thrill!

The opening Friday, September 1 of “Mike Lyon: Large Scale Drawings and Woodblock Prints” was a pretty humongous party! I suppose more than 600 people passed through the gallery that evening between 7 when the doors were unlocked and about 9:40 when Sherry Leedy shooed the last of us out the door. I saw MANY old friends which was just wonderful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbhP6GzapK0

my VERY old friend (when I lived in New York, I occasionally walked him to pre-school), the now best selling author Seth Mnookin and his friend (they later married) Sara visited the next day while they were in town for a wedding and it was great to touch base again (photo: Jennifer Bowerman)

My 1974-1975 painting instructor, retired chair of the Kansas City Art Institute’s painting department, Wilbur Niewald, was there — he just returned from a Guggenheim Fellowship spent painting in the Southwest US. He had the most wonderful time and we’ve got a dinner planned to find out all about it. Wilbur’s close friend, another retired painting professor at the Art Institute, Michael Walling was there and bought my “Fixing Hair” print. That was very nice.

Another KCAI retired faculty member, Victor Babu (of ceramics fame) visited and really seemed to love EVERYthing! He’s an enthusuiastic guy and characterized my big “Sara” reclining nude woodcut this way: “Omenish, very very omenish — the deep-deep-darks and the figure turned away — as if she’s sad or angry and maybe she’s talking about it — but what’s she saying? She’s rolled away up there but there’s that comfortable knitted thing up front — it’s soft, but she’s turned away from the comfort thing and us and all those deep blues — oh-menish… very VERY oh-menish!” — I asked him to please write my artist’s statement! (ha, ha)!

The director of the Kemper Museum, Rachel Blackburn, was there and bought the big “Sarah” drawing for their permanent collection. That felt great, I can tell you! Doug Freed, Director of the Daum Museum was there earlier with Dr. Daum and bought bought the big “Jon” drawing for their permanent collection! Wow and double-WOW! Very validating to me that these two excellent regional contemporary art museums stepped up and collected my most recent work on opening day!

The place was a veritable BUZZ of activity all night long — people pressing their noses right up against the prints and drawings, pointing and talking and it all seemed very energetic and positive! Now I’ve settled down a bit and am waiting for post-partum depression to overwhelm me!

This is a reduction print, printed by hand using Traditional Japanese woodblock printing techniques and materials (except, of course for the reduction part). Traditionally, each of the 26 blocks for this print would have been carved by hand from separate pieces of wood. But in order to save time and material and increase risk, I carved only three blocks — one to lay down an embossing for the background, one to print wood grain in the background, and the last one to print the 24 tones of the image. So each of the 52 sheets of paper was printed at least 25 times (but not all papers received the wood grain). For the various shades of blue which make up the print, I’d carve a bit, print each sheet, carve a bit more, print each sheet again a little darker, etc, etc, etc. twenty-four times!

"Mother and Child", July 2002, oban 15 x 10 inches, woodcut (moku-hanga) from several blocks with reduction -- most examples with woodgrain background from oak block

"Mother and Child", variant state without grainy background

David Bull,the well-known Tokyo printer,  held his 14th annual exhibition January 23-28, 2003 at Gallery Shinjuku Takano, Tokyo. David exhibits his prior year’s prints and sells subscriptions for his not-yet-produced work of the coming year.

For the first time, in addition to the beautiful prints he produces, Mr. Bull has included an entirely new section, “David’s Choice”, consisting of 8 interesting and beautiful prints selected from his own personal collection.

I was delighted when I learned that he had included my print among the eight selected from his personal collection. Mr. Bull wrote the following description to accompany the print (translated from the original Japanese):

Mother and Child

Type: ‘Reduction’ woodblock print
Artist: Mr. Mike Lyon (USA) – design, carving, printing
Date: July 2002

Out of all the woodblock prints you see in the gallery today, this is the only one that was carved and printed by the same person who designed it. It is an excellent example of a synthesis of western and tradtional Japanese woodblock techniques. The paper is washi, and the way of applying the pigment is the standard Japanese brush and baren method, but the way that the block was carved is completely alien to the Japanese tradition.

This is a reduction print – so named because it is made from a single block that becomes reduced in size as printing progresses. A full block covering the entire area of the image was first printed with the lightest pigment in the print. Enough sheets to make up the entire edition were printed this way (Mr. Lyon used about 50 sheets). Then a portion of the block was cut away… This procedure was repeated 24 times, ending with a very small block and a very dark pigment.

Because the block is destroyed during the process of printing a reduction print, no more copies can ever be produced, another major difference from the Japanese tradition in which blocks were used and reused many times, as long as there was a demand for the print.

Stand back a bit and look at this picture – you will hardly believe that it is a woodblock print!

Acquired: gift from the artist

I was imagining images like ‘a pretty girl with skirt tossed by autumn breeze and skeleton clinging behind’, or ‘skeleton with gust-tossed skirt’, or traditional: ‘madonna with infant skeleton’. Not too light hearted, but kinda comical in a dark sort of way. then it seemed like dogs would be naturally more comical than girls and skeletons, and so easy to draw! With Halloween approaching, I wound up with another one of those doggie designs with no place for the eye to pause, the subject of my design going something like:

dogs make their way through unfamiliar woods, the wind blows, rain begins to fall, lightning strikes, ghosts dance everywhere, there’s no way to know when time runs out…

Originally, I planned to use sienna, ochre, an autumnal pallette, but wound up luxuriating in the play between veridian and magenta, and the edition examples kinda developed on its own during printing. I wish there were a better punch line, or story. The humor connection seems so weak (what in the world did I think was so comical about inevitable doom, anyway? The ghost dog in the middle of the print got kinda lost in the pale part of the print, so I enhanced it a bit with mica — this was the first time I have tried mica — it was way, way too easy!! I hope it stays glued down and doesn’t get all over the other prints in the suite! That wouldn’t be too funny, either!

"It's a Dog's Day", Oct 2000, 10.5 x 8.5 inches, hanga (Japanese polychrome woodblock print)

• Artist: Mike Lyon (of course)
• Title: “It’s a Dog’s Life”
• Medium: Hanga (Japanese style polychrome woodblock print)
• Size: Chuban (10.5 x 8.5 inches)
• Paper: Gampi, handmade
• Quantity: 31 for Baren Exchange #7 (The Comedy of Life), plus 13 proofs
• Date: I began the design October 11, began cutting blocks October 13, and completed the printing October 27, 2000.
• Pallette: watercolors… Quinacidrone Magenta, veridian, Cadmium Yellow Medium, Prussian Blue, Chinese White, Sumi black
• Number of Blocks: 12 (19 carved, 7 not used for edition prints. Key block re-carved prior to edition prints to remove outlines from all except trees, lightning, eyes of center dog of trio, and border.
• Number of successive printings: 18 consisting of:
  1. ghost dogs shina block in white
  2. complete background shina block in pale blue
  3. complete trees shina block in pale veridian
  4. bokashi of background luan block in blue + sumi (bottom)
  5. bokashi of background luan block in blue (top)
  6. dog trio shina block in pale magenta
  7. bokashi of trees luan block in veridian (top)
  8. repeat bokashi of trees luan block in veridian (top)
  9. lightning shina block in yellow
  10. two back dogs of trio shina block in blue
  11. center dog of trio luan block in magenta
  12. lightning luan block in magenta and yellow
  13. repeat ghost dogs shina block in white
  14. bokashi of lightning luan block in magenta and yellow
  15. lightning luan block in yellow and white
  16. key shina block in black
  17. rain shina block in white
  18. ghost dogs shina block (center ghost only)
      in paste and affix fine mica into wet paste

Use a razor knife and straight edge to cut out the colored squares along the black lines. Paste 143 yellow squares over the 143 ‘M’s, 160 magenta squares over 160 ‘I’s, 186 red squares over 186 ‘K’s, 91 cyan squares over 91 ‘E’s, 73 green squares over 73 ‘A’s, and 74 blue squares over 74 ‘R’s in order to complete the portrait of the artist.

Portrait of the Artist, _/25 Mike Lyon 1997

"Do It Your-Self Portrait of the Artist", 1997, seven color Lithograph on BFK Rives paper, about 46cm x 61cm