Artists Working For Artists

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Say hello to Reed's new Master Printer: Sean P. Tracey

Photo by John Harris
"Waylon" by Sean Tracy
"Harvest" by Sean Tracy
"Willie" by Sean Tracy

Carrying on the tradition of excellence that former Reed print manager, Bob Coller Jewett did for 26 years, Sean Tracey personifies the Reed motto: “Artists Working For Artists” — and he does it with a distinctly local flair.

A fifth generation Coloradoan, Sean has navigated his way through the business of art while almost effortlessly blending three distinct vocations, artist (as seen on the lower left) and photographer, with the highly technical trade of commercial and fine art reproduction.

Entering the art business at that crazy point in time when the Digital Revolution was just starting to shake the Old School to its foundations, Sean immersed himself in traditional color correction, while mastering the technique of dry and wet etching of (real) film. Yet, when Photoshop made its first appearance in the early Nineties, he was not so entrenched in the old ways that he could not readily embrace the possibilities of this revolutionary new medium.

A longtime veteran of some of Denver’s most respected art reproduction storefronts, Sean can now add Reed Art & Imaging to his already impressive list of credentials.

Away from Reed, Sean stays busy in the creation of his own vision and credits Denver’s vibrant local art scene for the opportunity to feature and sell his work.

“I’ve been very blessed to have associated with and collaborated with many talented artists in the Denver Metro area. I have consistently averaged at least one solo and a few group art shows each year for over a decade now.”

Sean has always been excited about the possibilities of high-end inkjet printing  and now even more so, given Reed’s longtime dedication to this state-of-the-art method of color reproduction.

“I take great pride and honor in upholding the reputation of quality and excellence that Bob Reed has established for more than forty years. Each day I look forward to working intimately with many types of amazing artists and photographers throughout the country.”

The Reed Team is also excited about the possibilities that Sean Tracey brings to the company and looks forward to many years of working with this “Artist Working for Artists.”

The Big Picture 2019

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Barb Pullin and Thomas Carr "hang paper" at 40 West
Getting permission to paste is HIGHLY recommended.

The Gallery of The Streets

The biennial event, Month of Photography 2019 is in full swing, and a big part of MoP is The Big Picture. As usual, Reed Art & Imaging figures heavily into the mix. To date, we’ve printed over 220 large scale wheatpastes for some 25 artists and photographers. This year’s event marks the first time MoP wheatpaste art has been printed in full color.

For the uninitiated, the most commonly known example of this once ubiquitous advertising medium is French painter and printmaker Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, who raised the practice of bill posting to the level of street art in the 1890’s with his elaborate scenes of wild Parisian nightlife.

Though the popularity of the art form has ebbed and flowed, it has never gone away, and, in some respects, has even gained in popularity. Known as “flyposting” in the United Kingdom, street artists like Shepard Fairey leverage this old school marketing tactic to make provocative social and political statements, oftentimes in contradiction to the accepted or conventional wisdom of the day.

The basic wheatpaste equation? Image on paper + paste + wall + guerilla attitude = Street Art.

(Street Fine Art?)

As with all things MoP, The Big Picture has been advancing the cause of photography through the art of wheatpaste for some time now. In addition to Denver, Big Picture 2019 exhibitors can be seen in galleries and streets across France, Italy, Switzerland, The United Kingdom, New York, Jamaica and Mexico.

Closer to home, the father of MoP and The Big Picture, Mark Sink spearheads the wheatpaste cause with activities across the Denver Metro area.

Below, Mark & Friends (including some of the Reed gang) on a recent wheatpasting of the south wall of the 40West headquarters in Lakewood.

For more information on MoP 2019 events around town:

https://www.facebook.com/bigpicturedenver/

https://www.mopdenver.com/mop-2019#/thebigpicture2019/

https://www.facebook.com/events/764664260718312/

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/deconstructed-brunch-tickets-58461443752

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All photos by Gary Reed

Reed Art & Imaging’s New Space Has Been Acquired in the 40 West Arts District.

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After much searching, we have found a new home.

Due to expansion of Federal Blvd., we are losing our entire front parking lot. To maintain an environment of safety and convenience, we have to change locations. That’s the not-so-great news.

But the amazing news is that we will be relocating to the 40 West Arts District in Lakewood, Colorado. The new location is a mere five minutes west of our current

40 West is one of the fastest growing art districts, and we will be proud to call it home.

location in Denver, Colorado.

We are eager to start a new chapter in a city that fully supports the creative arts, and in an art district that is rapidly growing its ranks. The historic building, located at 8000 West Colfax Ave., was once the Lakewood Movie Theater. Listed in the Film Daily Yearbook of 1951 as seating 900. The Lakewood Theater was still open in 1955, but had closed by 1956. Eventually the theater housed a Volkswagen dealership, a furniture store, Yamaha motorcycles, then Harley Davidson motorcycles. We’re excited to bring the vibe of visual creativity back to this building.

As of the date of this post, the Harley Davidson dealership still resides in our soon-to-be-new location at 8000 West Colfax, Lakewood, CO while the finishing touches are being applied to their new building in Golden, Colorado.

We cannot begin our tenant improvements until the HD dealership vacates, and city permits for our changes are taking time. We’ll broadcast our grand-opening date as soon as we have it locked-in. Stay tuned by subscribing to our newsletter and following us on our social channels.

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Reed Celebrates 40 Years

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anniv40th-fbbanner

We’ve seen great change in the decades since we opened our doors.

Some creative mediums have shifted away from slower technologies into faster methods that allow artists to move faster into distribution of their editions.  Forty years ago, the internet was used exclusively by educational and government institutions and the idea and personal computing was limited to geeks and hobbyists.   Every print we made was exposed in total darkness and editions required very long hours (and sometimes days) of repetitive burning and dodging.

Modern technology has simplified some aspects of printing but some things haven’t changed at Reed.

Today, because your hard-earned reputation hangs in the balance,  every print is still hand-inspected for quality assurance and carefully hand-packaged prior to shipping to you or your buyers.  We continue to package as eco-friendly as we can because the planet we share deserves our respect. You wont’ find excess inks, plastics, or manufacturing in our packaging – just for the sake of making it prettier. We strive to eliminate excess material waste from the beginning of your job through delivery to your door. And we source from recycled and reclaimed materials when it’s appropriate.

Holding on to the old-ways is a good thing.

We think that old-school craftsmanship still has a place in the world of fine-art editions – that technology should be seen as a tool and not a primary focus in doing business.  While many vendors in our industry push further into electronic automation, we continue to keep the human element of craftsmanship in the areas where it matters most.  And like the old-days, you’ll find we welcome open conversations between you the artist and those who make your prints, because your artistic vision is more important to us than putting up barriers. Yes we actually see you as important – not as an inconvenience.  Some values are worth holding onto.

Thank you for everything you have done to help our continued success in this industry!

Sincerely,

  The staff and family at Reed Art & Imaging.

Staff Wheat-pasting for Month Of Photography 2015.

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Every two years the highly energetic creatives here at Reed turn things up to 11 when Month Of Photography(MOP) comes around. This bi-annual event has gone global in its reach and this year was no exception. MOP 2015 has seen large-scale gallery participation in support of photography as an art form, and the outdoor attraction of wheat-pasting is exploding in popularity. We’ll have a several posts covering activities around this event, but this bit of fun is one of our own.  This is the second time that we have made the exterior of our building available for wheat-pasting artists during MOP. An art form traditionally using black and white images on inexpensive paper, this year our team decided to go bold with a splash of color. We had a great time hanging the work of our in-house artists with a special section reserved for winners of our social media competition. This show’s curation and direction was handled by our own Barb Pullin and Gary Reed.

The reviews for this show have been mixed. Traditionalists don’t care for the color – some quite adamantly against it, while those willing to step outside of tradition are looking to embrace it in their works for the next MOP.   Have a look and let us know your thoughts. Should wheat-pasting be black and white only, or do you appreciate the color?

Update: We’ve had five pieces stolen from this show – peeled right off the walls!

 

Behind the Scenes – Outdoor Installation for Month of Photography

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It’s a busy street corner, and the building is vacant, but an eyesore it’s not. Now dressed in the fine art of Liz Hickok, the building is now sporting jewel like colors and makes a bold statement – all in honor of a show at Michael Warren Contemporary Gallery in Denver’s Santa Fe Art District.  Part of the bi-annual Month of Photography, this is just one of dozens creating a buzz. Liz Hickok’s amazing art joins pieces from all over the globe. Kick back and relax as Gary Reed and Jody Akers install this magnificent artwork.

Colorado Photography Festival 2013

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Held from August 10th – 15th, this 6 day workshop is chock full of classes, workshops and photo adventures. The event starts off with back to back presentations by 5 ultra-talented photographers who will provide thought provoking discussions and slide shows that will educate and inspire. The kick-off presentation by Glenn Randal (www.glennrandall.com) is destined to be a great opportunity for the Auto-exposure only crowd seeking to get the most out of their cameras by learning the benefits and intricacies of going manual for maximum creative control. Grant Collier’s

presentation on night-time landscape photography (www.gcollier.com) will surely be a crowd pleaser. Grant’s portfolio and experience in shooting night-scapes under the stars is nearly unmatched. If you have ever experienced shutter-block ( my name for the photographers equivalent to writer’s block), Dan Ballard’s (www.danballardphotography.com/) presentation on unlocking your creative potential is sure to provide you with tools to expand your artistic vocabulary while providing some preventative medicine for those times when shutter-block show up.

There are many outstanding workshops available throughout the remaining 5 days and some are so promising they are virtually guaranteed to fill up fast. Click here to learn more and register for this event.

Reed Art & Imaging is proud to again sponsor the Colorado Photography Festival.

The Last First Friday of MoP

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1stFriday_April_2013First Friday Art Walks in Denver are always a blast. The galleries open their doors to the public for later the normal viewing and a little “wine and cheese” type atmosphere. Whether you are in the Santa Fe Art District, known as the hub of the Denver art scene, or any of the seven others around town, you are bound to see amazing art and some fascinating characters.

The creative community in Denver is

Sticking Your Art Where It Doesn’t Belong; The Big Picture Project

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The Month of Photography is upon us! One of the events in Denver, Colorado for 2013 is The Big Picture street art project. Led by local photo impresario Mark Sink and co-hosted by Art-Plant and Artwork Network, The Big Picture plans to paper the outside walls of buildings around Denver with large format prints of images from local, national and international photographers. The first Big Picture in 2011, exchanged images not only with cities around the United States, but cities in South America, Switzerland, England, China, Mexico, Canada, France and Germany. The 2013 Big Picture will be sending and receiving photos from across the U.S.A. and around the world!

 

wheat-paste-engraving

Toulouse-Lautrec with on of his posters for the Moulin Rouge

“Street Art” is generally defined as: ‘art, often political or dealing with social themes, displayed on streets, sidewalks or walls of public spaces and often without permission of the property owner.’ There are quite a few types of media used in the creation of street art. The medium we normally associate with street art – paint, is actually fairly new on the scene. Bansky, building on the earlier paint-and-stencil work of John Fekner and Blek Le Rat has, over the past 15 years, become the most well known artist in that genre.

The medium of wheat-pasting paper on walls dates back to the nineteenth century and was used mostly for commercial purposes: advertising of products and events, especially circuses. Art and commerce began to merge in the 1890s when Toulouse-Lautrec’s posters for the Moulin Rouge, theaters and other events, papered the walls of buildings around Paris. Ernest Pignon-Ernest took wheat-pasting to a higher level and has been pasting amazing art projects on the walls of Naples,

obama-hope-style

Shepard Fairey’s 2008 “Hope” political campaign poster

Soweto, Brest, Ramallah and more since the 1960s. In the United States, Shepard Fairey gained notoriety as a sticker and wheat-paste artist with his “Obey Giant” series and achieved national recognition with the 2008 Obama “Hope” poster.

 

Computers and wheat paste have joined forces to bring photography to the streets. Photo files submitted to the Big Picture are being emailed around the world to sister cities in the project. The files are then printed and pasted locally. The Colossal Reed Art & Imaging Galactic Headquarters (CRAIGHQ) building at the corner of North Ninth Avenue and Federal Blvd., was the first Denver location to be pasted to kick off The Big Picture Project for 2013. Mark Sink, Peter Davies and others in the Big Picture pasting crew were joined by Gary Reed, Barb Pullin, Jody Akers, Bob Jewett, and Merhia Madsen (and her daughters Annabelle and Maggie) from Reed Art & Imaging to put the first batch of images up on the walls. The work at Reed isn’t complete! In addition to more Big Picture images to arrive, Reeds’ employees will be pasting the building with their own fine art images in the weeks to come. Also to be included will be several images from the winners of Reeds’ recent facebook contest held in honor of The Big Picture Project and the Month of Photography. Make sure you stop by to see what’s new!

 

The Big Picture website will be posting a map of the locations where images have been pasted locally and around the world. Look for it so you can take your own tour and see the amazing art prints posted on the walls about town! If you’d like to get in on the project, Big Picture is taking submissions through March 15. So hurry on over to the Big Picture website for all the details and get your photographs on the street!

 

Click to see the e-book of Big Picture Project images from 2011, and watch for the 2013 book due out later this year!

 

Additional Links:

The Big Picture Facebook page has plenty of pictures of the pasting at Reed Art & Imaging.

Fresh Art Photography will be taking part in the Big Picture project.

YouTube: Ernest PIGNON-ERNEST – Les peintures urbaines (4:42) A retrospective of Pignon-Ernests’ wheat paste installations in HD!