Simply Haiku: A Quarterly Journal of Haiku and Related Forms
Spring 2005, vol 3 no 1

Woodblock Prints Gallery

| Return to Simply Haiku | Entry Page & Thumbnails | Previous | Next |

Islands

"Islands" ~ Woodblock print by Carole Baker
(from #15 series at Baren Forum)

From these old hands
Lettuce seed blows away
Engulfed by the wind–
A sparrow clings to the edge
Of the swinging birdfeeder.
—Donna Ferrell

(verse from Mountain-Home Modern Waka)


Carole BakerOriginally from Florida, Carole Baker moved to Alaska in 1969 and worked for the Public Health Service as a medical technologist before moving to the small community of Gustavus in 1974 with her commercial fisherman husband and young son.

In 1995, Carole learned the Japanese method of printing from Canadian printmaker Noburo Sawai. Watercolor pigments with no noxious chemicals makes it suitable for working inside during the winter months. In 2001, she joined the Baren online group of woodblock printmakers where she continues to learn and make prints for Baren exchanges.

Carole strives to obtain the compositional qualities of traditional Japanese prints. She has found direction in the principle of Notan as taught by Arthur Wesley Dow and studies the Japanese masters: Hokusai, Hiroshige, and others, as well as the prints of Walter Phillips.

She still finds most of her inspiration for subject matter in her immediate surroundings through hiking, camping, and kayaking. In addition to woodblock printing, Carole also continues to paint with
watercolor and occasionally acrylic. She has kept journals of sketching and writing for many years, and recently has begun making her own journals and artist's books.

Email contact: caroleb@gustavus.ak.us


Copyright 2005: Simply Haiku