3GatosPress

Alejandra Mares and Xavier Moreno finished their studies as visual artists at the Universidad de Guadalajara , in 2009 with a degree in painting.  Until 2016, they decided to make printmaking due the excitment of this technique and its plastic and visual opportunities.  It is in 2017 that several events occur that confirm the strength with which Alejandra and Xavier are betting on their work in the graphic medium.

2016:  Colective show at the Historic Archive in León Guanajuato.  Beginning of the “Estampas Tortilleras,” project created by Alejandra and Xavier to keep a public present in a printmaking collective show, which lasted for 3 months.

2017:  Invited by Art history teacher Joni Hand and tremendously supported by Printmaking teacher Hannah March; Alejandra and Xavier took a residency at Cape Girardeau MO; during a whole month, the artists made workshops, art talk, critiques and a show at Catapult Creative Gallery.  In the capital of Guanajuato, the “First National Meeting of Mobile Workshops” took place where I participated along with
several mobile workshops in Mexico.

2018: Art show at Rockford Illinois invited by Sarah Reed McNamara; during 3 days, the artists made a workshop with the community.  Beginning of “Estampas Tortilleras con Artista Invitado.”  Participation on the “Linocute contest 2018.” Trükimuuseum, Estonian Print & Paper Museum. Tartu, Estonia,” “Open Press Project,” an interesting exhibition of mini prints produced with a 3D etching press in the city of Cologne, Germany.  “Ambos Lados”, organized by the Taller Grafica Libre (Oaxaca) and Horned Toad Prints (Texas). “Exlibris insects,” organized by Taller central de grabado from the city of Zacatecas and “Nervo 100+,” organized by the Workshop of Contemporary Graphic “Gabazo.” Tepic, Nayarit. Alejandra Mares won a second place of in the “Faulkner Márquez”artshow hosted by Creative Catapult Gallery in Cape Girardeau, Misuri.  Demonstration of “Estampas Tortileras” outside the Museo de las Identidades Leonesas in León Guanajuato Mexico. Currently our cat member Xavier is the art director of the MAPC Journal for Mid America Print Council.

2019: 3GP were published in “The Hand Magazine,” a magazine specialized in graphic processes of hand printing.  Two exchanges with Poland (for second time!) and the United States, “Uncanny Valley: A picture without us” of Wroclav, Poland and “Relief Conspiracy” organized by Scott Mintzy.  A collaboration with MAPECO of Uruapan on the occasion of the “One hundred years without of Emiliano Zapata,” doing weathpasteups of Zapata in several cities in Mexico.  “Diversity” portfolio exchange between Mexico and Germany.  Second place at “Primer Concurso de Grabado Zacatecas,” organized by the Government of Zacatecas Mexico.

2020:  “High quality international project in contemporary printed graphics” in the Republic of Tatarstan in Russia.  Because the pandemic, we started a series of live streamings in Instagram called “Gato Encerrado” (Locked cat) doing collaborations with several artists around the globe,making a big hit in that social media channel due the interesting links we built. Right now, we are on our vol. 2 of “Gato Encerrado.”  We had an interview on the amazing podcast Pine | Copper | Lime with Miranda Metcalf and a spanish version with Reinaldo Gil Zambrano.  Participation on print exchanges organized
by Darcy Edwin and Morgan Pryce Participation in the “South West Print Fiesta”

2021: 3GP continued their work with the “Locked Cat VOL. 2″ print exchange, in this edition we had another great number of featured artists!, like: Studio7x7, Joseph Velazquez, Kill Joy, Chris Estrada, Carlos Barbarena, Adam from The Hand Mag and more!
We also had our first pasteup tzompantli (row of skulls according to day of the dead festivities in Mexico) receiving multiple submissions from all over the world. We glued these skulls inside a cemetery in the city of Guadalajara Mexico.

2022: 3gp had some workshops outside Guadalajara; like the Print Party hosted by Carrie Valenzuela from Amaranth Press at Delavan Studios in Syracuse NY; where we had a lot of fun printing and meeting the great people at Syracuse, we also had a quick visit to Syracuse University to meet their beautiful art building, we had a great visit hosted by Dusti, printmaking art teacher.
We also had a great visit to Tijuana city! We had a workshop with talented artists from the city. This trip was hosted by Dog_Brain, local artist and great friend with arts supply from Speedball!.
We had again our pasteup tzompantli, this time glued outside the train hub in Guadalajara city, a 3 day demo in the most important book fair in Guadalajara, we printed live with the beautiful minipress from Openpress project run by Martin Schneider; a lot of people could see printmaking in action!

2023: We had a feature chapter in Hello Print Friend podcast with Reinaldo gil Zambrano and the rest of this year looks promising for these cats, with a lot of printmaking on the road!

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