Papergraphica

Christchurch

Papergraphica is a printmaking studio operating from a converted house in Christchurch, New Zealand. It is the only workshop of its kind in the country and provides a collaborative environment in which artists work with artisan printers to produce original lithographs, woodcuts and etchings of an international standard.

The studio was set up by master printer Marian Maguire in 1996. After completing a BFA at Ilam 1985, Maguire studied at the Tamarind Institute of Lithography in Albuquerque USA. On her return she set up Limeworks and has since established herself as the foremost lithographer in the country producing work with the leading figures of New Zealand contemporary art.

Each artist travels to the studio and generally stays for a week. There they work with Maguire on a series of images. They draw directly on litho stones, etching plates or cut wood to create printing elements that they further manipulate through the proofing process to create finished pieces. Each printmaking process has a quite distinct character. It is the artists response to the chosen medium that enlivens the finished work: that work being executed in only the finest of materials to achieve the highest archival standard.

The prints are called original multiples as they are created within the printmaking process and then refined through a further working of that process. Reproductions by contrast start with an original and through a photographic process produce copies.