Lois Harada is an artist and printmaker working in Providence. She studied printmaking at RISD and settled in Rhode Island after graduating with a BFA in 2010. She works at DWRI Letterpress, a commercial letterpress printshop where she also prints her own work. Harada utilizes text and the medium of the poster to tell her family’s story of incarceration—her paternal grandmother was interned in Poston, AZ from 1942–45. She takes inspiration from propaganda printed and distributed by the US government and prints with type and equipment similar to that which would have created the original works.
Harada has exhibited her work across the US and internationally. Her work is included in private collections as well as at the RISD Museum. Her practice is bolstered by residencies, and she is currently preparing for a five-week residency at Anderson Ranch in Colorado in spring 2023. She recently finished a seven-year term on the board of New Urban Arts, Providence’s nationally recognized, free arts drop-in program, and now serves as chair of the Art in City Life Commission serving the city of Providence.
An introductory level course for Painting majors. Students will develop drawing skills and insights and consider basic visual language issues. Syllabus is coordinated with Painting I.
Open to Sophomore Painting Students.
Major Requirement | BFA Painting
This workshop is a four week introduction to letterpress printing. We will work with handset foundry type, wood type and photopolymer plates tocreate finely printed specimens of type and image. We will learn Pantone color mixing and matching and discuss papers and substrates suitable for the process.
Participants will learn to design for the letterpress printing process and prepress techniques for creating successful photopolymer plates. The course will also cover proper Vandercook Proof Press setup, inking, cleaning and troubleshooting.
Elective
This workshop is a four week introduction to letterpress printing. We will work with handset foundry type, wood type and photopolymer plates tocreate finely printed specimens of type and image. We will learn Pantone color mixing and matching and discuss papers and substrates suitable for the process.
Participants will learn to design for the letterpress printing process and prepress techniques for creating successful photopolymer plates. The course will also cover proper Vandercook Proof Press setup, inking, cleaning and troubleshooting.
Elective
This workshop is a four week introduction to letterpress printing. We will work with handset foundry type, wood type and photopolymer plates tocreate finely printed specimens of type and image. We will learn Pantone color mixing and matching and discuss papers and substrates suitable for the process.
Participants will learn to design for the letterpress printing process and prepress techniques for creating successful photopolymer plates. The course will also cover proper Vandercook Proof Press setup, inking, cleaning and troubleshooting.
Elective
Color is a phenomenon of light and pigment and is an expressive and symbolic component of art and design. Color exists in myriad forms: as ink on paper, as pixels on computers, paint on canvas, as light on screens, and reflected off surfaces of objects both natural and man-made. Through a series of exercises and assignments, students in this class will explore the power of color-seeing color in action as well as examining and creating color relationships and operations. Students will rotate through two faculty for six weeks each, and in doing so, explore how designers utilize color and how color gets applied to surfaces. Students will develop a general understanding of color theory and applied color through observation and articulation. These techniques and skills will serve as a complement to your other required core courses. A blend of lectures, demonstrations, studio exercises, assignments, and critiques, will allow students to observe, articulate, analyze, and practice the use of color.
Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Graphic Design Students.
Major Requirement | BFA Graphic Design
Color is a phenomenon of light and pigment and is an expressive and symbolic component of art and design. Color exists in myriad forms: as ink on paper, as pixels on computers, paint on canvas, as light on screens, and reflected off surfaces of objects both natural and man-made. Through a series of exercises and assignments, students in this class will explore the power of color-seeing color in action as well as examining and creating color relationships and operations. Students will rotate through two faculty for six weeks each, and in doing so, explore how designers utilize color and how color gets applied to surfaces. Students will develop a general understanding of color theory and applied color through observation and articulation. These techniques and skills will serve as a complement to your other required core courses. A blend of lectures, demonstrations, studio exercises, assignments, and critiques, will allow students to observe, articulate, analyze, and practice the use of color.
Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Graphic Design Students.
Major Requirement | BFA Graphic Design
In this Graphic Design studio, students will learn the building blocks of book construction. In addition to handwork and bindery skills, students will work to set type, manually and digitally, to match their conceptual vision and learn to plan, execute and create well crafted book projects. The course will cover the history of the book from codexes and manuscripts all the way through modern zines to give us context for our technical work. We will study the medium of the artists’ book which, though rooted in traditional book forms, take on any shape and design that the artist can imagine. This medium has a rich history—we’ll study exemplars in the Special Collections archive and visit with contemporary artists in the field.
Craft is essential to creating effective forms that tell the story of our design practice. How can the technical skills learned in traditional book binding be adapted to your vision and voice?
Elective