Life & Work with Justina Freel of Pasadena

Today we’d like to introduce you to Justina Freel.

Hi Justina, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
As a young girl with a wonderment & curiosity with nature, I knew very early on that when I grew up I wanted to be an artist. Coloring outside the lines, I found my path when I attended an art focused high school, and continued on to graduate from an environmentally progressive college; The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. where I studied ethnobotany, floriculture, and garden horticulture. Through college studies I was able to blend art and horticulture in the study of creating botanical illustrations. I found the scientific field of horticulture was not creative enough for me, so when I graduated college I learned the craft of floral design, another blend of my passions for art and flowers. For many years I have been a floral designer, loving the opportunity to work with beautiful flowers, though I do not like the widespread chemical and pesticide practices common in the floral industry, or the tons of waste sent to the landfill generated from an event lasting only a few hours. In response to feeling not fully aligned with my path, I changed my life direction and applied to study at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, where I received a BFA in Fine Arts Illustration. Exploring every possible material and artistic process, I gravitated towards printmaking and painting in watercolor, even though the school would not accept any of my watercolor paintings as art. Coming around full circle with all of my studies in art, ethnobotany, floriculture, and garden horticulture, my current path as a enthnobotanical artist focuses on holistic kinship with native fauna and flora through multiple transecting mediums of watercolor painting, printmaking, and multi-dimensional silhouette collages.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
As a female artist creating outside of the traditional medium of oil painting, it has been hard to find art gallery representation and space for showing my mediums of watercolor painting, mineral pigment printmaking, and hand cut paper silhouette collages. My subject matter of native plants and animals is also outside the common themes of human portraiture and landscapes. Rooted in ethnobotany, I seek to transcend the rigors of scientific botanical illustration into energetic forms that are ephemeral and free flowing.

Seeking to not use toxic chemicals in my artistic process, I studied the ancient artists to find natural materials and methods. This took many months and lots of trial and error to revamp the printmaking process from ink to cleanup. The only printmaking inks commercially available are made with synthetic pigments and chemical additives, so I set out on a journey to make a non-toxic natural printmaking ink. Raw materials of flax seed oil and natural mineral pigments are combined and hand mulled into a printmaking ink with the consistency of a creamy nut butter. The mineral pigments retain their natural sparkle and energetic depth. Cleanup is simple with non-toxic citrus based cleaners.

In an age where there are many synthetic materials made from fossil fuels and most people are completely separated from the earth, it is a challenge to communicate with people that art can be made with simple materials of earth mineral pigments, the colored soil of human art for hundreds of thousands of years.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Kinship with native nature.

I am a watercolor painter, printmaker and silhouettist. Each medium is unique and allows me to explore different facets of the native plants and animals that I connect with through my art.

My artistic focus is the flora and fauna indigenous to Turtle Island. In my own lifetime, I have seen the erasure of native habitats of California quail and sage due to unrestricted alteration to the environment through city construction development. There is a deep comfort beyond words being surrounded by an environment filled with all of the local web of life native to the area – it really creates a unique sense of place that cannot be replicated anywhere but at that spot. The diverse beauty of native plants and animals form unique patterns that blanket the meadows in patchwork quilts of color which translates into my use of textiles as physical and as metaphor. The native environments of this land have been broken, chopped up, and divided, with wounds that are still open. The land needs care and to be stitched back together. Through my art I hope to connect people with the indigenous animals and plants of their local area and region

There is a freeness to painting with watercolor as the elemental flow of water is present in the movement of pigments across the paper in layers building upon layers like the creation of soil over time. Watercolor painting is a forward movement of art creation where you cannot go backwards if you feel you made a mistake, one must just go with the flow.

In my art studio I have two printmaking presses, a Vandercook #4 Proving press circa 1936 for making letterpress mineral pigment art prints and greeting cards, and the other is an Conrad etching press custom built in 2015 to my specifications tailored to my textile pressing process used in my paintings and silhouettes.

With the Vandercook printing press, I am able to create letterpress art prints and greeting cards with my own illustrations made into printing plates to be printed with my own color blends of mineral pigment printmaking inks. Every step of the letterpress making process is by hand.

Hand ground mineral pigment
Hand mulled flax oil organic printmaking ink
Hand cut paper
Hand printed one at a time
Hand folded one at a time
Hand tied packaging one at a time
Hand made with love

Each print is a unique expression of mineral pigment, paper, and printing press. I intentionally select mineral pigment colors to create emotional moods that are soothing and tranquil, complimenting the pigment color with the paper color.

Using the Conrad etching press, I have envisioned a unique process of preserving the patterns of antique textiles by pressing the heirloom fabrics into full size (parent sheets) of paper (around 26″w x 40″h inches). As a result of the pressure of the etching press rolling over the fabric and paper, the physical form of every thread is embedded into the paper which carries with it the story of that textile. Primarily created by women throughout all time, the embroidered and lace textiles that I use in my art connect to the matrilineal heritage of craft at its core. Square and rectangular shapes of embroidered table linens and doilies become the textural frames and shapes that I cut apart and stitch back together in my watercolor paintings. The sheets of textile pattern de-bossed pressed paper become the base material to cut out silhouette forms of plants and animals that I collage and arrange into multilayered scenes reminiscent of a diorama or shadow box. The forms of the paper cut silhouettes come alive in their interaction with the light of the room as it changes throughout the day. Subtle gradients of shadows are cast upon the wall. I created a unique method to frame the multiple layers of glass in a way that creates depth of shadows and incorporates the continuation of the wall through the art piece.

Currently I have a solo art show entitled “Arriving Home” at Santa Barbara Botanic Garden of mineral pigment letterpress prints/cards and paper silhouettes sharing the little life moments of six local birds in their native habitat.

What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?
Mainstream cultural perspectives are currently changing to see the beauty of their local native plants. More will continue to convert their lawns into meadows of wildflowers, and the appreciation/love for native plants will grow. Awareness will increase of the importance of local native plants be allowed to flourish in the holistic web of life to support all beings. Natural materials from the Earth have always been part of human culture and we will see a return to these natural materials and methods as many will reject synthetic toxic materials and pigments made from fossil fuels.

Pricing:

• Letterpress cards $6-10
• Letterpress art prints $28+

Contact Info:

• Website: www.justinafreel.com
• Instagram: @justinafreel
• Other: https://faire.com/direct/justinafreel

Image Credits
Portrait: Amy Dickerson Photographer 1. Fringe Benefits: Mineral letterpress art print 2. Quail Poppy Meadow: Mineral letterpress art print 3. Orchid of the Mohave: Watercolor mineral pigment painting 4. Orchid of the Mohave: Butterfly detail crop: Watercolor mineral pigment painting 5. Foggy Coastal Meadow Bouquet: Textile pressed-paper silhouette collage 6. Meadow of the Rising Sun: Textile pressed-paper silhouette collage 7. Elderflower Letterpress Card 8. Pale Coneflower Letterpress Card 9. Quail Poppy Letterpress Card