The International Printing Museum is pleased to host a special one-day exhibition of prints by Dirk Hagner at the Fair.
Dirk will be presenting his work and answering questions in the Museum Front Gallery at 11am and 2pm on October 6, 2012. Other work may be seen at his booth, B50. Join us for this very special exhibition!

Portraits:
“Dirk Hagner’s large scale woodcuts have long addressed his interest in artists, poets, writers, and actors – always with some very personal fascination. These people are celebrities – although, some are rather obscure. There is inherent romanticism in Hagner’s work, which, perhaps, is not surprising for an heir of German expressionism: Hagner believes in magic. He subscribes to the moment of illumination – or transcendence – when a work of art gets inside of you, and you feel euphoric. It would be a mistake to perceive Hagner’s homage’s as analogous to Warhol’s celebrity worship. One of Hagner’s portraits in this show is of German printmaker Horst Janssen; Hagner’s interest as an artist is akin to a man’s interest in his forebears.”

- Christopher Michno

“No poetic lines are needed to tag Hagner’s woodcut portraits as literary: the majority of the subjects are writers, artists associated with literary and political as well as visual art movements, or public figures whose iconic visages have become intertwined in our minds with profound quotations and world-changing slogans. And, again, Hagner treats these subjects as discursive presences, people with stories to tell, people we tell stories about, people whose very presence before us stimulates our sensitivity to word and image alike. In his treatment of these figures – which subtly mimics the stylizations associated with their eras – Hagner zooms in on, heightens and refines this stimulation.”
- Peter Frank, “Dirk Hagner – Discursive Presences”

Letterscapes: (shown at the Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena)
My letterpress work is an amalgamation of Asian and Western aesthetics, calligraphy, and landscape. The use of writing and letters for mark-making in conjunction with current issue of the day give the work a contemporary sensibility. My letter scapes reflect the East Asian concept of calligraphy being an integral part of painting, while confirming the significance and meaning of the words themselves.

Dirk Hagner
Works on Paper
www.DirkHagnerStudio.com