World Dream Bank topic: Woodblock Prints

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Prints--Woodblock, Lithographs, etc.

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Dream art in the styles of woodblock, monoprints, lithographs, scratchboard etc. Of course many are digital or hybrid, not traditional--I put it here if it looked like a print. I'm intrigued by that look--the idea of limited colors and an inherent grain in the medium--it's so much like what we early digital artists (do you remember the 20th century?), had to work with--limited palettes, jaggy pixels. So why not make a virtue of necessity?

But printmaking also reminds of dreamwork. It can be an art, and dreams can intentionally make art (and tell you "Hey stupid, it's art," like Jung's anima--not that he believed her), but both are indirect--the dream is like, say, Hokusai's brush drawing, which then gets carved on a printing block (written in a journal) scrupulously but never perfectly, by an assistant (the conscious mind) who may not understand the master's intent; and it acquires a certain grain inherent in the wood (in the words); and what others see is yet another step removed, a transfer from that block/journal, colored (edited)... With so many steps to distort the data, boldness works best.

Dreaming itself may be private (though I have my doubts just how private: see dream telepathy) but WRITTEN and PAINTED dreams are, in a weird way, cooperative ventures. Not an art form for control freaks!

RELATED TOPICS: art experiments - painting - pure digital art - watercolors - felt pen and colored inks - pencil (much of it digitally tinted later) - ink - web comics - printed books and comics - picture-poems - sculpture - See also the full INDEX OF SUBJECTS.

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	BEAR READ DUNE: by Wayan; dreamed 1981/1/28, painted 10 years later. There are many astral planes--this world's just the cellar. A cat and a bird in love, a literate bear and I guard the astral stair...
	BUTTERFLY: by Zhuang-zi; c.300 BCE, a dream questioning identity. I dreamed I was a butterfly, fluttering about, content with my lot. Suddenly I awoke and was Chuang-tzu again...
	CAT REPELS DINOSAURS: by Wayan, 1984/8/12, a film-inspired surreal dream DAY: I thorn-puncture my hands while gardening, and write stupid poetry about it... EVE: I watch Little Darlings, a teen sex farce that turns weirdly serious... DREAM: a Mysterious Pussy guards us librarians from stinky alien dinosaurs... CAUTION: SEXUAL INNUENDO???
	COMING TO THE JUMPING OFF PLACE: by Jenny Badger Sultan, 92/5/1, painting of an escape dream Trapped on an island, spied on and controlled, we decide to jump off a cliff and die; but as we jump, a spirit sneaks us off be reborn...
	A DART IN HER CHEST: by Wayan; 1984/8/21, a predictive dream A woman loses patience with sexual harassment in an Air Force training program, and stages a die-in. But why's she wrapped in an orange towel, why a dart in her chest? CAUTION: TROUBLING REAL-WORLD AFTERMATH
	DATIN' DEMON: by Mark Varitz and Wayan; 1989/12/3; Mark's dream triggers one by Wayan. I meet my personal demon, and discover it has a personal demon: me! Am I worse than my Shadow? CAUTION: LANGUAGE, NUDE MONSTERS
	THE DEVIL'S TRILL: by Giuseppe Tartini; c.1713, a musical inspiration dream. I sold my soul to the Devil. On an impulse, I handed him my fiddle. To my wonder, he played a sonata of exquisite beauty. When I woke I retained only echoes...
	DOG THIRST: by Cecy and Wayan; 1991/10/7, shared or telepathic dreamlets CECY: In a desert, a thirsty dog jumps out of a tree--the first known dog suicide... WAYAN: I'm a talking dog. Our owner denies us enough water, so we protest...
	FAIRE DINOSAUR: by Wayan; 1981/5/5. A dream of forbidden love. I fall in love with a sexy T. Rex at the Renaissance Faire. Then things get weird... CAUTION: DINO ABUSE
	FASCION: by Wayan; 1992/8/13. Nondream digital poster on beauty & gender A sardonic little poster on dating-role reversal with helpful advice... CAUTION: PHALLUS INVADES PHOTOSHOOT
	FISH BIRTH: by Katherine Metcalf Nelson; c.1978/11/15; a nightmare My little son accidentally tears the tail off our goldfish. The wound looks vaginal. The fish, moaning in pain, turns into my daughter...
	FISH REMAINS: by Katherine Metcalf Nelson; 1985/9/18; a ritual closing-dream On my 45th birthday, at the end of my eight-year dream-art project, I dream of a women's rite turning scraps of chewed flesh into a whole fish I offer to the fishbowl in the heart of the Vatican...
	FLIER MISJUDGES REEFWORLD: by Wayan; 2018/12/16, an otherworldly dream on... social media? A girl from a low-gravity, dense-air world, where you strap on wings and fly, tours a world of tropical atolls with me. I love sailing, but flight's spoiled her for it--too slow...
	HAWKING COUNTRY: by Wayan; 1994/2/3, a quantum-level dream. I read Stephen Hawking, and dream I'm in the Quantum Desert, full of bridges, holes & loops-- like the microstructure of spacetime. But it's not counter-intuitive at all--it's HOME!
	HORSE IN A TAILWIND: by Wayan; 1982; study of a dream character It looks like a study of negative shapes, but if you happen to be a part-time horse, like me...
	LEONINE TRINITY: by Wayan; 1989/11/6 digital print of recurring dream (first: 1987/11/28?) A goddess in a dream once told me to seek 3 and only 3 qualities in a mate... CAUTION: NUDITY
	A LOST STATION ON THE TOKAIDO: by Wayan; erasable crayon, 1981/12/6. A nondream vision. A tribute to Hiroshige's moonlit landscape prints of the lonely roads of old Japan...
	"NOHOR!" YELLED THE NIGHTMARE: by Wayan; 1982/12/27, a passionate nightmare. I dreamed a black mare was howling "Nohor!" At first I thought she meant "I'm not just a horse", but... CAUTION: SEXUAL ISSUES
	PEGASUS: by Wayan; 1991. Digital "woodblock print" of recurring dreamfigure. This strong slender mare is how most of my flying dreamhorses look: a practical lot, they know...
	THE PLANTER OF SEEDS: by Victoria Goro-Rapoport, 2011, print based on recurring dreams I often dream I'm lost in a strange city, wandering the unfamiliar streets in search of something unknown, and possibly unknowable...
	PLUMBER'S HELPER: by Katherine Metcalf Nelson; 1981/12/8; a punning spiritual dream A stopped-up mystical toilet gets cleared by an unexpectedly colorful tool; but then, you never anticipate what'll unplug your, um, "head"...
	POOL OF TRUTH: by Katherine Metcalf Nelson; 1983/10/1; a dream of shamanic descent Night. A massive crash on the highway. Bodies strewn. Sickened, I descend a spiral stair to the Pool of Truth. It gives no answers. Women spout platitudes. I go on, in pain, down past the polar bears... CAUTION: THE DEAD
	RAGNHILD'S TREE and HALFDAN'S CURLS: by Queen Ragnhild and King Halfdan of Norway; c.850 CE twin dreams predicting their children and nation will prosper. Ragnhild sees a lovely tree rooted in her pain and blood; Halfdan sleeps with pigs and dreams he has a great head of hair... CAUTION: KIDNAPPING, ARSON, GENERAL BARBARISM (check the date!)
	RAVEN'S MIRROR: by Wayan, 2022/8/15, a surreal shamanic dreamlet A raven summons a levitating mirror that shows her face as a human, and tries out moods & expressions based on Tarot cards plucked from a tree...
	ROBINSON JEFFERS AS A SHAMAN: by Wayan; 1996/7/28, a life-review, with 2016/10/22 followup Jeffers, that harsh, visionary, ecological poet, seems drunk on Darwinism, blind to kindness--or is he just reporting Big Sur's true, mean spirit(s)? CAUTION: LITERARY AND MYSTICAL
	RONALD REAGAN STOLE MY SOUL!: by Wayan; 1983/3/7; a dream-comic I was a robot who had a soul--till the Reagans stole it! I track them down, and demand it back. Simply confronting them works--the hole inside me is filled... CAUTION: CAUSTIC POLITICS
	SHANGRI-LA: by Wayan, 1973/11/13, a teen's mystical dance-party dream I visit Shangri-La, the ancient Tibetan valley of refuge. Unicorns graze. We drive around on car-sheep. Robin Hood rebels against the Priestess of Gloom. Pilgrims in silly gauze robes arrive. Or are they just tourists? Oh, well. Toga party! CAUTION: GAUZE ROBES, NUDE UNICORNS
	SILKY'S WOODCUTS: by Wayan, 2006/12/15, an art-prompt dream with spiritual overtones I dreamed I'd made a set of woodblock prints showing a scene from varied times & angles: my anima Silky, part girl part mare, contemplates another set of prints--famous Zen ones...
	A THIRD POLITICAL PARTY: by Wayan, 2020/11/30, a dream on deliberate viral spreading I find three street parties full of half-naked dancers, jammed together for warmth--and maskless! Not parties--anti-masker events. Sexy, but their protest risks our lives along with theirs... CAUTION: FLAMES SCIENCE DENIERS
	TICHANE: by Wayan; 1992/11/7. Nondream digital "woodblock print". What the world looks like when you have environmental illness, like me...
	WERTZ!: by Wayan; 2023/10/14, a night of cartoonist-inspired dreams After seeing Julia Wertz's cartoon history of her entire dreamlife (on one big page!) I dream Wertz style all night! I don't mind the nightmares--what gets me down is comics' black & white... CAUTION: NIGHTMARES, SEX
	WHAT E.S.P. IS FOR: by Wayan; 2012/12/10, three dreamlets on my real nature and purpose I dream ESP isn't just for oneself. A romance between a wolf singer & a deer guitarist. I'm furry too, and better accept it!
	WOODCUT: by Wayan; 1998/8/13. Digital "woodblock print" of dream-self. Cartoony self-portrait as I paint with Persephone's pomegranate paintbrush. A mock woodblock print... CAUTION: CARTOON NUDITY