Collaborating with artists to make a good impression

Master printer and Riverdale resident Judith Solodkin created several of the prints displayed in the Lehman Gallery’s exhibition, Mythology of the Print. The ex exhibition emphasizes examples of experimental works by modern printmakers that are redefining the medium.

Ms. Solodkin is on the forefront of the movement to expand the borders of traditional printmaking. “I work with other artists to translate their work into another medium,” she says.

In 1974, Ms. Solodkin was the first woman to graduate as a master lithographer from the Tamarind Institute, part of the college of fine arts at the University of Mexico in Albuquerque. She established her printmaking company, Solo Impression, in Manhattan the following year. She moved to her current location on Riverdale Avenue in 2011.

Ms. Solodkin describes her printmaking process as one of collaboration whereby she and the artist create a final work that satisfies both. The method is often intricate and the pace slow because she says at each step along the way, “We’re trying to figure out what do — how to proceed.”

For the past 15 years, Ms. Solodkin has used digitized embroidery to add a tactile quality to some of her prints. She uses a computerized six-needle embroidering machine that translates a drawing to a sewing file. The needles then sew the design in thread. She also uses an electric sewing machine to manually sew stitches onto prints.

Ms. Solodkin says the art world has traditionally viewed embroidery as what she terms low art, whereas painting is typically considered high art. “It’s not taken as seriously because it’s women who predominately do it,” she says of embroidery.

This notion is satirically portrayed in a piece Ms. Solodkin teamed with Elaine Reichek to create titled The Pounds, 1913. The work refers to a conversation between Ezra Pound and his future wife Dorothy Shakespear in which the poet encourages his paramour to paint rather sew. Ms. Solodkin highlighted words in the print to accentuate the title and points in the conversation.

In addition to working as master printer producing hand-printed lithography, woodcuts and linoleum cuts, Ms. Solodkin is a milliner who makes hats. She has also taught at the School of Visual Arts and the Pratt Institute.

Though she has scaled-down her printmaking operation, Ms. Solodkin has no plans to retire, saying, “I’m working with major galleries, major museums, major artists and major works of art.”