Ingrid Calame

Ingrid Calame’s works are boldly-colored, multi-layered abstractions, which bring to mind imaginary maps, ghostly human forms, stains, and graffiti. Her work begins with tracings or rubbings from a multitude of sources, which are then combined and retraced before being transformed into drawings, paintings or even pure pigment installations.

Calame’s recent prints at Graphicstudio introduce rubbings and the figure as a new juncture in her work. In this suite of three prints, Calame began by making rubbings with charcoal on tissue paper of the faces and bodies of her family, friends, and colleagues. The rubbings of arms, legs, hands and feet are expressive: their gestures indicate emotion, age, and gender.

Calame states, “When I make a charcoal and tissue paper rubbing of a person’s face or body, I get to know them in an entirely different way within a couple of minutes, the bones and creases of their face like geological formations discovered through the paper. Afterwards my perception of them is altered: I see the structure of their face, the way they hold their hands and how they embody their age, sex, and self differently.”

While in residence at Graphicstudio, Calame slowed the original rubbing event by making etchings of the rubbings using spit-bite, burnishing, sugar-lift, hard ground, and soft ground techniques. She combined frottage drawings of body parts with rubbings of carpentry tools or musical instruments to juxtapose bodily movement with mechanical movement. By overlaying these images in printed colors, Calame creates a narrative of desire, control, and vulnerability.

Ingrid Calame is an American based artist who now resides in Los Angeles, CA. Calame was born in 1965 in the Bronx, New York and grew up in Westchester County. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the State University of New York at Purchase (Purchase College) and received a Master of Fine Arts in art and film from the California Institute of the Arts. Her work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, among others.

 

Further Resources

Artist's Site: ingridcalame.net

Printmaking + Sculpture Terms

Printmaking Glossary

Sculpture Glossary

Sales

For sales, or more information about an edition, please contact Graphicstudio at (813) 974-3503 or gsoffice@usf.edu.

Copyright + Reproduction

Images of the artwork are jointly owned by the artist and Graphicstudio. Reproduction of any kind including electronic media must be expressly approved by Graphicstudio.