Joan Dix Blair makes woodcuts, etchings, and monoprints, using traditional techniques. She chooses her plate material according to her concept - copper or wood or plastic. Her "vocabulary" is abstraction, simplification, and storytelling... Printmaking as a language.


Her inspirations come from the landscape of Massachusetts where she lives. A series of etchings about salamanders and their habitat occupied the artist for several years. These are long scroll-like etchings, accompanied by a ceramic installation, and short videos of a pond.


In 2018, Blair began a series of etchings based on the typology of oak leaves. One of these drypoint prints was selected for a Southern Graphics Council Traveling Exhibit.


She titled another exhibit "Leaves" -- with a double meaning. She draws tree leaves from life - and the etchings leave evidence of the artist's life. The group is titled "Quercus" (oak) and presented in a portfolio box. Blair quotes painter Luchita Huetado: "Trees are our closest relatives because they breathe out and we breathe in."


The most important influence on Blair's printmaking education was participating in workshops at Kathan Brown's Crown Point Press in San Francisco, CA.