Join us in the auditorium for a conversation with Jesse Shaw on his creative process in developing the American Epic series of linocut prints, a work in progress that he has dedicated 14 years to thus far. Jesse will discuss how he uses personal memory, American and art history, and cultural iconography to build imagery, as well as his personal experience working on a long-term project.

About the Artist:
Jesse Shaw is a printmaker from Tennessee primarily working in relief prints carved from linoleum blocks. His work is based in the narrative, satirical, political, and social commentary tradition of the graphic print. Jesse is currently working on a series of fifty prints depicting the epic story of America. He has completed 30 prints in the series over the past thirteen years. Prints from his “American Epic” series of linocut prints have been exhibited nationally in Nashville, New Orleans, New York, Ft. Lauderdale, Philadelphia, New Jersey and North Carolina.

Jesse has been an invited guest speaker at several universities, including the University of Anchorage Alaska, AK, the University of North Carolina Greensboro, NC, Pennsylvania College of Technology, and Vanderbilt Divinity School, TN. Apart from academic activities Jesse has worked as a professional printmaker in fine art print publishing at Durham Press, in Durham, PA and curated and co-founded Print Riot, an annual print fair in Easton, PA. He received his MFA in Printmaking from Rhode Island School of Design in 2009 and his BFA from Austin Peay State University in 2007. He currently teaches drawing and printmaking at Texas A & M International University in Laredo, TX.