Our Story

We are a group of friends and artists in Toronto, most of us recent graduates from the Ontario College of Art and Design. We are comprised of illustrators, graphic designers, printmakers and new media creators, but we all have a love and interest in silk screen printing. We have been participants in group and solo shows in the last year, but as a collective we want to enable ourselves to reach a wider audience. If we could build a studio to produce more work for show and sale, we would be able to thrive from our art, and would be able to table at art and community events, not to mention be able to work as a for-hire silk screen studio. The idea is to build the studio for personal and collaborative projects. Thunderbird will also gives us a great opportunity to put together a new group show, and ideally we will be working on a show to be conceived and created all from our humble studio. We would like to have the studio fit, finished and furnished by the end of the summer, to buckle down for a long winter of printing!

Gillian Blekkenhorst, http://www.blekkenhorst.ca/

Katherine Verhoeven www.verwho.com

JJ tebrake http://johanntebrake.blogspot.com/

Erin Ornstein http://users.livejournal.com/_intothetrees_/

Igor Provod http://igorprovod.carbonmade.com/

Trevor Henderson http://trevorhendersonillustration.blogspot.com/

Jenn Woodall http://www.jennwoodall.com/

Misha Snyder www.mishasnyder.com

Mary Verhoeven

The Impact

As young artists, resources are hard to come by. It's also difficult to afford secondary spaces for the production of art, and continuing experimentation. We have the space, but now we need to make it real and functional. Without your donations, none of us will be able to work on screen printing. We won't have the opportunity to make zines, cards, prints, full scale pieces, and will miss great opportunities. Your donation will help not just one person, but nine start a new way to live and thrive from the creative process. Your donation ensures our continued ability to live from drawings and design.

Our first project will be a series of 11"x14" posters for an upcoming show.

What We Need

PLUMBING
$35  Garden Hose 60'
$10  Plumbers Tape
$10  bucket for waste water.
$10  screen to keep chunks of paint from going down the drain

MISC
$15 Clothes Pins and String for drying. hopefully the drying racks and space ought to be enough.
$20 Water Resistant Insulation Foam
$20  Screws
$20 Insulation foam and sheet plastic

$30 two squeegees

$60 three buckets of primary inks

$30 printing clamps

$14 screen cleaner

$30 emulsion

EXPOSURE UNIT
$120  four 4 foot long Black Light Bulbs
$200 Exposure Unit:
- big sheet of glass or plexi
- electrical/wiring
- Black drop cloth
- red safe light

Other Ways You Can Help

If you're in the Toronto area and are at all able to donate anything from the list above, we'd love to hear from you!