Albert Noyer

I’ve always liked watercolor, even though it’s said to be a difficult medium. Stylistically, I try to make the image work without losing the revealing characteristics of the medium. Since many of the scenes that attract me run the danger of a picturesque interpretation, exploring the nature of watercolor is essential to balance that tendency toward tightness that many illustrators have. Transforming ordinary subjects into significant images is the aim of the process. Some works incorporate paper collage that gives an increased sense of place to the scene.

Woodcut is a stronger medium than watercolor: bold imagery, oily inks, and physical effort in cutting and printing the block. That first proof is always exciting and somewhat unpredictable – transferring the grain and knots of wood planks to paper and recognizing the characteristics of the cutting tools.