The Ulrich Museum of Art, as part of its Senior Wednesday series, invited Wichita State faculty member Marco Hernandez to lead a printmaking demonstration. 

Hernandez has been a part of Wichita State’s School of Fine Arts faculty since 2016. In those ten years, he has become an assistant teaching professor of print media and foundations coordinator of the School of Art, Design and Creative Industries (ADCI). 

Hernandez originally hails from Mexico, and his roots inspire a major part of his artwork.

“My work is all about my culture,” Hernandez said. “Because I was born in Mexico, and I live in this country, I feel like with my work I’m able to connect myself to my culture, because my work is all about that.”

Ava Wilkie, a second-year student, shared that she’s “done a bit” of printmaking before, which led to her interest in Hernandez’s program. 

Wilkie said that prints can be both identical to other prints and also unique.

“With prints, you can make as many as you want, and they’re all identical, l and anyone in the world can access that,” Wilke said. “It’s different now with the internet and everything. Anybody can do that, but historically, I think there’s some significance to print.” 

Some of Hernandez’s students came to the printmaking demonstration, including junior Mikaila Saldivar.

“He takes the time to actually work with the students and actually help them improve their work,” Saldivar said. 

Saldivar brought along Elijah Frese, a non-WSU student. Frese said that he would like to “learn a little bit more about printmaking.”

“I’m not super familiar with it, so I’d love to see how it is and what it looks like today,” Frese said. 

Another student of Hernandez, junior Aydan Wondra, came to watch the demonstration. Wondra is a ceramic major and student in Hernandez’s interdisciplinary studio class. Part of the class requirements is to attend multiple artists’ talks hosted by the Ulrich. She said she was interested in printmaking because of the “very physical aspect of it.” 

Among the select group of students in attendance was an abundance of seniors looking to connect with Hernandez’s work, including 75-year-old Martin Mendoza. Mendoza found out about the program by looking at the schedule. 

Mendoza was also drawn to see another Mexican artist. Mendoza had previous experience in printmaking, which he said was “a long time ago.”

On top of making friends, one of Mendoza’s goals for the day, he also hoped to see “what their latest development is in printmaking and just looking and enjoying the art.” 

Hernandez began the program by introducing the audience to different printmaking techniques. In his demonstration, Hernandez showed intaglio (metal plates), relief (wood, linoleum, or rubber) and silkscreen (mesh screen). 

Hernandez then donned his apron and took the group into the new printmaking studio, which opened last semester. Hernandez gave a live demonstration of what it looks like to make prints. 

Here, Hernandez informed the audience about editions, a tradition where you make a limited amount of prints before ruining the original block. 

“So this one right here is an edition of 30. So I made 30 of these, and then after you’re done printing 30, the traditional thing to do and the right thing to do is to break your block or scratch it up. That way, nobody else can print it.” 

Hernandez highlighted one aspect that makes printmaking unique. 

“It’s very very difficult to print a consistent edition with all the processes. You have to — it’s like an art in itself — to be consistent every time you print something,” he said. 

Although, Hernandez said, he isn’t a huge fan of doing this for editions. 

“I personally don’t do that because, I mean, I don’t really make a lot of money selling my work. That’s why I have a day job, right?” Hernandez said, drawing a laugh from the crowd.

But, he added, it is not the money that motivates him. 

“I make prints because I love the process and I love printmaking. That’s the reason I do it, not to make a living,” Hernandez said.