Black Eagle

John Ihle

John Ihle had long been fascinated by the pre-colonial histories of the Americas and elsewhere. He found inspiration in Indigenous pictography and symbolism, beginning with an early childhood visit to the Natural History Museum in Chicago. He would revisit this source of inspiration as a student of Mauricio Lasansky at Illinois Wesleyan in the summer of 1949.

John Ihle spent time in Northern Canada in 1969 and began a series of collagraphs in 1970 he titled the "Canadian Series", which he set aside to work with photo etching, and continued through 1976. He added other images into the mid 1980s. Many of the images were printed in small editions, such as this. Ihle was known to sell his printed plates as "paintings" and further editioning was often not possible.

"Black Eagle" was the name given a number of First Nations chiefs as well as a lacrosse player who competed in the 1904 Summer Olympics for Canada which won the bronze medal in the lacrosse tournament.

Ihle worked on a series of color intaglios he titled the Canadian Series, which incorporated his interpretation of this imagery. Though this print was created nearly a decade after he had completed the series, he continued to explore these themes, as he did in "Black Eagle."

John Livingston Ihle was born in Chicago, Illinois on 1 February 1925. He spent many summers of his childhood at the uncle's farm near Thief River Falls, Minnesota and winters in Sarasota, Florida. At a young age he showed an aptitude for art and he took special art classes in high school.

During World War II, Ihle served in the U.S. Armed Services and was injured during a counter-attack at Strüth, Germany. After his discharge, he took a series of tests at the Illinois Institute of Technology and he was counseled to choose scientific illustration. A recipient of the GI Bill, he enrolled at Illinois Wesleyan University in 1946 where he majored in art and science. While there he came under the influence of two young instructors, Francis Chapin, a former student of Hans Hofmann, and Charles White, a recent graduate of the University of Iowa and student of Mauricio Lasansky. Ihle stated, "I found myself devoting as much time as possible to the copper plate and continued in printmaking the remaining years as an undergraduate student at Illinois Wesleyan University."

During the summer of 1949, Ihle enrolled at the University of Iowa to study printmaking with Mauricio Lasansky. He returned to Wesleyan in the fall and received his B.F.A. in 1950. Ernest Freed, Professor at Bradley University and a Lasansky student, viewed Ihle's graduate show and offered him graduate assistance at Bradley. Ihle became Freed's graduate assistant and earned his M.A. degree in 1951.

Ihle moved back to Chicago and took a position as botanical illustrator at the Chicago Museum of Natural History. He became associated with a group of young artists who were recent graduates of the Art Institute of Chicago. Ihle rented a small studio on the Near North Side and his first solo exhibition was at the 750 Studio in Chicago in 1951.

In 1952, Ihle moved to the San Francisco Bay Area hoping to find a teaching position. He shared an apartment on a houseboat on the Sausalito waterfront and a studio on a barge next to the houseboat. In 1954, Ihle enrolled at San Francisco State College for a teaching credential and, in 1955, he was appointed to a full-time position as instructor in art at San Francisco State University where he founded the metal arts and printmaking programs. In 1957, he received the first of three commissions from the International Graphic Arts Society.

John Livingston Ihle died on 30 November 2002 in Marin County, California.