"I love submitting to this show because it is so friendly and fun!"
-Kathleen VandeMark, 2006 Award Winner

"It is one of the few statewide shows left that travels...a year's worth of exposure!"
-Bruce Thayer, 2006 Award Winner

Each year over fifty Michigan artists enter more than 140 prints to the competition. Our juror typically selects 30% of the works entered. The juror has full jurisdiction over the works he/she considers to be part of the printmaking genre. Once the works and awards are selected, the exhibit will open at Alma College with a reception and awards ceremony. The exhibit then travels for twelve months to other venues throughout the state. a catalog, listing accepted works, awards, and donors, is created and distributed to each gallery hosting the print show.

Founded in 1981 by Kent Kirby, the Alma College Statewide Print Competition exemplifies the vision Kent Kirby had for the liberal arts college art program that would serve undergraduate students and promote professional standards and practices. For twenty-five years, the Print Competition has brought internationally known jurors and outstanding Michigan artists to campus and has in turn traveled away from campus to provide art centers around the state with exhibitions of recognized quality - at minimal expense.

Knowing how longevity often confers its own kind of prestige, Kent was proud of the work done to keep the show going by successive print show coordinators, visiting jurors, administrative and student assistants. And until his death in June 2005, he continued to support the Print Competition both as an artist and donor.

Kent's research on the technique of collotype printing grew from his long interest in the interrelationship between art and technology, and the innovative work included in this exhibit would have intrigued and delighted him. In an artist's statement, he once wrote:

"There are several ways to think about any medium, but prints in particular offer a variety of approaches for artists. It seems to me that the close reliance on an intimate relationship between craft and technology is one of the fascinating legacies with which the printmaker lives. Regardless of how futuristic the artist's intended vision, he is constantly aware of existing in a tradition and indeed, of his reliance on it. Subtleties of the image quality mirror the finesse required by the technique, and the process is itself a very personal relationship between human and machine."

Founder:
Kent Kirby

Ghosts IV , 1979
collotype

archives
24th Annual (2004-2005)
25th Annual (2005-2006)
26th Annual (2006-2007)