ART FESTIVAL : Five South Bay exhibits will celebrate printmaking as ‘a true art form.’

The South Bay will celebrate the art of printmaking during the next two months as part of “L.A. Print ‘93: Southern California Perspectives in Printmaking,” a festival exhibiting at 22 locations countywide.

Five South Bay venues will join commercial and public galleries throughout Los Angeles in a tribute to the history, evolution and contemporary directions of lithography, etching, silk-screen, woodblock and other printmaking.

The Los Angeles Printmaking Society’s 12th National Exhibition, co-hosted by the Laband Art Gallery of Loyola Marymount University and the Beckstrand Gallery of the Palos Verdes Art Center, will award more than $4,000 in prizes to competing artists during the festival.

Snubbed by some critics as being less than a fine art, printmaking gets its due during the “L.A. Print ‘93” festival.

“Maybe this is the beginning of an opening up to (printmaking) as a true art form and we’ll see prints hanging beside other works of art in museums and galleries,” said Peggy Jo Sivert, curator of the South Bay Contemporary Museum of Art, a venue that until now has rarely exhibited prints.

Printmaking began in 8th-Century China but has strong contemporary roots in Southern California, said Gordon Fuglie, Laband Art Gallery director and organizer of “L.A. Print ’93.

“Printmaking became a major art form in American culture in the 1960s through the Tamarind Lithography Workshop in Los Angeles,” where artists from other disciplines came to experiment with printing, Fuglie said.

Printmaking is “among the most intimate of art forms,” he added, used more often for personal and political expression than other visual arts.

The Printmaking Society’s exhibit at the Laband Gallery and the Palos Verdes Art Center is the festival’s only juried event. Henry T. Hopkins, chair of the UCLA art department and director of its Wight Art Gallery, selected the works of 49 printmakers for the show after viewing 1,700 slides from artists nationwide.

Winners in the competition will receive their awards at the Laband Gallery opening reception on Saturday from 4 to 6 p.m. A reception for the Palos Verdes show will be held Jan. 22 from 7 to 9 p.m. Both receptions are free and open to the public.

Also on exhibit at Loyola will be etchings and lithographs by master printer Ron Adams and 15 works by artist Thomas Stubbs. The Palos Verdes show highlights monoprints and monotypes, including a hand-colored linocut and woodcut monoprints.

Through Feb. 26, the Torrance Joslyn Fine Arts Gallery will feature 48 works by 12 artists including pieces by several South Bay printmakers. The prints range from primitive woodblock to computer-generated works, creating a historical survey that follows the evolution of printmaking, curator Barbara Johnson said. A public reception for the 12 artists will be held tonight, from 7 to 9 p.m.

El Camino College Art Gallery will exhibit etchings, photogravure, monoprint and mixed media collage by five printmakers from Tuesday through Feb. 5. The show’s opening reception, Jan. 22 from 7 to 9 p.m., is free and open to the public.

At the South Bay Contemporary Museum of Art, graphic installations by two printmakers explore culture and conflict. Artist Ricardo Marrero Rosado has created a series of eight hand-colored lithographs to tell the story of “Legends of Puerto Rico.” Connie D. K. Lane’s “Hong Kong-Los Angeles” combines computer-generated graphics and text to explore the artist’s personal struggle as a foreigner in Southern California. The exhibit runs through Feb. 3.