Nest

Adrienne Cullom

Like her Atelier 17 predecessors Ian Hugo and Joseph Hecht, Adrienne Cullom uses sharp, delicate linework to portray creatures in environments that verge on the surreal. Collum enrolled in the Atelier in 1961 on a scholarship from the French government after studying painting in Atlanta, GA, and in Vienna; engraving quickly became a passion of hers and she continues to work in the medium today.

In “Nest,” two birds are perched in their delicately balanced structure, one using its beak to feed the chick that stretches its head hungrily toward its dinner. Beneath, strange animals with wings, fins, and claws appear to take refuge beneath the nest, lending a dreamlike, surreal narrative to the composition.

According to Cullom, "Nest" is pure engraving; she only used engraving tools and #7 was her favorite tool. Each plate would take a couple of years to complete as she could only work in her studio once the children were in bed. The rich lushness of the black ink is a result of the artist using French Charbonnel black ink and handwiping the plate before printing it on her press.

Adrienne Cullom was born in Memphis, Tennessee on May 27, 1938. She studied at the Atlanta Art Institute in Georgia from 1956 to 1959 and, following her graduation, she traveled to Austria where she attended Vienna's Akademie fur Angewandt Kunst for one year. Receiving a scholarship from the French Government, she went to Paris, where she studied at Stanley William Hayter's Atelier 17 from 1961 to 1962. Cullom met fellow printmaker Sergio Gonzales-Tornero at Atelier 17 and he followed her to Atlanta. They married, moved to a small railroad-flat apartment in Greenwich Village in New York, and raised a family.

In New York, they continued their pursuit of printmaking by working at Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop in lower Manhattan. In 1968, they moved into a house in Mahopac, New York, acquired from Sergio’s publisher in exchange for prints, and set up their print shop.