I’ve now spent a year painting the proofs from the corresponding seasonal changes of my tree. And have gone into a litho studio to work on litho color plates to proof the suite in color.

Who cares? I’m only explaining because the need/idea was to work on a cycle of death/rebirth from something I know well – my backyard fig tree. I wanted to work with a hammer and chisel against the resistance of the hard cherry wood. I wanted a crisp, hard edge graphic black white look for the print suite. I wanted them to all be related – so the woodblocks are all the same size and the image is the same position of branches, just changes in leaves/fruit.

I cut the blocks knowing I’d be printing the suite on flat mulberry paper as one set of prints. I’d also be printing the suite on molded handmade cotton/abaca paper so the woodcut marks will print like intaglio – the handmade paper will fill the cuts and print as embossed white paper. The negative/positive spaces and black line and white line cutting are important."

Eric Avery