Rachelle Mark

When Smith was accepted by the Royal College of Art in London to participate in the Post Experience Programme, which offered him the opportunity to draw from cadavers at the University of London’s School of Medicine, he worked on variations of images, including interpretative anatomical sketches of body parts. These drawings are captured in his powerful series “Silent Orators”.  Additional work on this series includes the lithographs produced in Berlin, Germany, working at the Professional Association of Berlin Artists (BBK) printmaking facilities, as well as etchings from acrylic hard grounds, and the non-toxic etching process using photopolymer film. Smith developed his “Berlin Air Lift” studies drawn in situ at Berlin’s Templehof airport, and later re-interpreted, and printed them as linear images with the photopolymer film process at Berlin’s Druckstelle Printmaking Studios. Continuing his work at BBK, Smith further developed a selection of drawings done in India and produced as lithographs.Other thematic works i.e., Smith’s etching editions of “Warrior Suit of Armor”, “The London Bagpiper” and “Italian Youth”, as well as conté crayon drawings and digital prints, represent interpretations of images captured in selected art museums abroad and in the U.S.  Currently, Smith produces drawings and prints in his printmaking studio in San Diego, California, and works periodically in professional printmaking facilities in Berlin, Germany.Smith’s prints have received juried awards, including a purchase prize by the Pasadena Art Museum for its permanent collection.  His heavily embossed etching triptych titled  ‘Ranger I,II, III’  was  on loan from the Los Angeles County Art Museum Rental Gallery  to the NASA Jet Propulsion  Lab in Pasadena California.  Smith’s work has been shown in numerous private and public solo and group juried exhibitions. His works are currently being prepared for national and international exhibitions, and for public and private galleries and collections.

Walter Askin, painter, printmaker, sculptor, and teacher, was born in Pasadena, California on 12 September 1929. He studied sculpture, painting, and printmaking at the Pasadena City College where one of his mentors was Leonard Edmondson. Askin went on to study at the University of California, Berkeley where he earned his BA and MA degrees. He began his lengthy teaching career in 1956 at the California State University, Los Angeles where he became Professor of art. He was also a visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley; the California State University, Long Beach; and the University of Hawaii. He served on the board of directors of Pasadena Art Museum; Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art; and the Baxter Art Gallery, California Institute of Technology. Askin is member of College Art Association of America and one if the originalk members of Los Angeles Printmaking. He was honored with awards for his teaching and his art and his work is represented in the collections of the Albright-Knox Gallery, Buffalo, New York; the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; the Kunstlerhaus, Vienna; the Oxford Museum of Modern Art, England; and the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.