Dietrich Varez

While watching the emotional international news coverage about the deaths of two amazing humans - John McCain and Aretha Franklin, here on the Big Island of Hawaii, another loss hits home as well. Well-known and beloved artist Dietrich Varez recently died, (on Lunel's b-day August 14) leaving an amazing legacy of art created during a long and art-ful life -- right here in Volcano Village.

We are planning to participate in an an upcoming workshop offered through Volcano Art Center that will include making our own prints from some of his carved blocks that have been donated by his family.

(Wikipedia)

The studio where Varez works and lives is in a rural forested area near the small town of Volcano, Hawaii a few miles from the entrance to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. He built the house himself after many years of living in tents or cabins on the land or in the Park. For most of his life there, he and his family have lived a self-sufficient pioneering life. They capture rainwater for their needs, and had no electricity for thirty years. The road to his home has been described as “barely passable.”^[5] Varez and his wife rarely leave their homestead, virtually never travelling off-island.

Varez, as a self-taught artist whose career developed outside framework of the institutional art world, maintains a strict policy of keeping prices low and distributing directly to the widest audience. This is consistent with his earliest practice of giving away prints, and only then, when demand required it, of charging nominal prices to cover his expenses. It was only after several years of a growing reputation that he decided to make his living from the sale of his work, and he has expressed in interviews a deep ambivalence toward being considered a professional artist.

"Some people have told me that until I start charging more, I'm never going to become a 'known artist.' I think that's nonsense. You either like the print or you don't, and that shouldn't have anything to do with the price. My goal is to make art -- at least my art -- available to common people. I don't give a damn about the art people; I want to get it into your mom's house and my mom's house.”^[5]

Contrary to the usual practice among print makers, he refuses to limit his editions, printing until a block is exhausted. He dates his prints according to when the print was struck, not, as is customary, when the block was carved. These individualistic practices may have limited the value of his work to collectors, but Varez has said he is committed to staying outside the artificial boundaries of art world conventions. "The printmaking business needs some new blood and new traditions,” he has been quoted as saying.^[2

Samples of Dietrich Varez ART