Terri Thoman

Setting her path as a Printmaker, Terri Thoman returned to Texas with a BFA from Swain School of Design, and in 1982 she would connect with Peregrine Press in Dallas, TX, working with Mike Heart and Jerry Lempke, assisting as an Intaglio printer. This position would offer her a studio space to continue her personal work. It did not take long for Thoman to realize that the North Texas area was lacking a resource so desperately needed, and in 1983 she established Paper Routes, to supply artists of all disciplines a vast and unique selection of fine art paper from around the world. It was from this base that she could begin connecting the dots of a long, artistic career in Printmaking.

As an Artist, Thoman had a propensity for sharing ideas, technique, and process; this conviction would be the foundation of her commitment as an Artist/Educator. Through the 1980’s Terri would work as a consultant, creating workshops for Booker T. Washington School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Dallas, enhancing the quality printmaking education established by Polley Disky. Her ability to communicate and inspire students of all ages would connect her to opportunities through the 1990’s, working with Regional Art Guilds, Dallas Community Colleges, Dallas Museum of Art Adult Education, Southeastern Oklahoma State University, and to the Creative Arts Center of Dallas, where, in 2006, Terri Thoman would establish the Printmaking department with a focus on alternative Non-Toxic process.

A pivotal experience in 2014, when Thoman was accepted into a residency program at Scuola Internazionale di Grafica, would increase her printmaking community and ability to share ideas, and focus of non-toxic alternatives. This four year experience of learning and teaching was the catalyst for Terri to create the Fine Print Studio in Dallas. A place to share knowledge, to create opportunity for other printmakers, to uplift each other and connect the artistic dots.

Eking a life of self employment and self motivation, Thoman has maintained her personal printmaking practice, moving in and out of distinct bodies of work. The series entitled EARTHMOVES, began in the early 1980’s. Through her monotypes, Woodcuts, and intaglio prints, Terri works with direct gestural marks in the matrix, exploring the horror hidden behind the beauty of nature’s displays. Another body of work , she describes as her “Therapy”, began after divorce and having no studio space. The CHINESE ZODIAC series began in 2004 with 2” square relief engravings, “ just to occupy my hands” she would say. By 2014, Thoman had discovered the “STEAMROLLER”, bringing printmakers together in a parking lot, somewhere to print with road equipment.

When she joined the Print Austin group for their annual Expo in February, Thoman chose the theme of the Chinese Zodiac to correspond with the timing of the Lunar New Year. It would be 2022 when she was approached with the proposal of exhibiting the entire collection for Chinese New Year. 2023 would be the year of carving, completing the remaining eight and a half blocks and print all twelve editions, THE GREAT RACE exhibit opened January 2nd, 2024. There is yet, one more theme of fascination for Thoman, the CARYATIDS, which she began thirty yeas ago. They continue to evolve with current social issues. In the beginning these works pondered gender in our societal routines; as in architectural structures, like the Caryatid, woman, has been carrying a weight for thousands of years. Pillars of family structure, doomed by fate to continue to endure. Now, Thoman’s Women of Stone are bent by the burden of our social and political climate, stresses from which woman can find no escape. The Caryatid is the embodiment of youth, piety, and feminine strength, but can they prevent us from crumbling under this current climate? Thoman’s fortitude through the decades, witnessing the shifting landscape of our graphic media, she maintains a practice, embedded in traditional process, creating illusions with the rawness of her simple mark making and the art of the Print.