Spudnik Press Cooperative has 4 permanent staff. Our Board of Directors works closely with staff to guide overall policy and direction. Each year, we work with 4 Fellows who monitor our open studio program, and approximately 25 teaching artists.
Our Member Directory highlights the amazing community of artists involved with Spudnik Press Cooperative.
Mike Pennekamp is not only the Studio Technician at Spudnik Press. He is also an internationally exhibited artist, printmaker, and illustrator. Mike earned his BFA from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville in 2010 and spent the next five years working at Tom Huck’s Evil Prints in St. Louis, MO. Eventually he decided to earn his terminal degree and, in 2017, graduated University of Arkansas with his MFA with a concentration in Printmaking.
Email: mike@spudnikpress.org
Angelika is the founder and owner of Design by Angelika, a multi-service design and print shop based in Chicago, Illinois. We specialize in design for all of life’s special occasions and love to work on projects that reflect our love for travel, illustration and all things nature. We’ve worked with engaged couples, expecting couples, non-profits, small businesses, illustration lovers to create custom invitations, commissioned art, logos and branding, tattoo designs and so much more!
Currently a designer in Chicago, Brendan Robson graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with a BFA in Graphic Design in May of 2017. As a designer Brendan enjoys exploring the areas of intersection between analog and digital content and the opportunities for discovery that exists within that space. Primarily focused on aspects of design, printmaking, and multimedia installation, Brendan’s personal body of work addresses themes of memory constructs, genetics, digital identity, and stasis.
As part of my fellowship at Spudnik Press, I would like to continue to explore these ideas and produce a primarily screenprinted publication (or publications) that brings together research, imagery, creative writings, and more about queer experience and memories of queerness. The idea that the senses activate memories, and environments activate senses, allows for an exploration that continues the core theories I have applied to my work over the past year. One aspect of these publications that I would like to pursue is the idea of deliberately leaving some sections blank for a collaborator to come in and add a design/drawing of their own. By screenprinting this series I believe I will have more unique controls over the structure of the book than riso-based processes, and this will also allow for expressive compositions and a stronger narrative.
Nicolette has long been a contributor to the Spudnik Press community. Since first joining our organization in 2012, Nicolette has been an active member and volunteer, while teaching many of our relief printmaking and bookbinding classes.
She holds a BFA with an emphasis in Printmaking and Book Arts from the University of Central Florida, and an MFA in Interdisciplinary Fine Arts from Washington University in St. Louis.
She is the Studio Manager at Double Trip Press, a premier letterpress studio located in the East Lakeview neighborhood.
@rosspressandbindery
nicoletterossprint@gmail.com
Jake Saunders is a Chicago artist working in printmaking as well as drawing and painting. Hailing from Muncie, Indiana, Jake grew up with a love for a variety of narrative based art forms, which became his focus in his art practice. After becoming fascinated with the unique aesthetics of woodcuts and etchings and their aptitude for seriality and multiplicity, Jake earned a BFA and MA in printmaking from Ball State University and went on to earn his MFA at the University of Connecticut. He has since gone on to show nationally and internationally. Today, Jake’s work amalgamates narratives to explore the concept of tragedy in forms both grand and mundane.
Carla Fisher Schwartz is a visual artist and educator based in Chicago, IL. Her studio practice investigates the relationship between the mapped image and contemporary notions of exploration, virtuality, and the simulated environment through print media, sculpture and video installation. Her art has been exhibited across the United States, including the Chicago Artists Coalition (Chicago, IL), the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum (St. Louis, MO), the Hyde Park Art Center (Chicago, IL), the McKendree University Art Gallery (Lebanon, IL), and the Kala Art Institute (Berkeley, CA). Recent residencies include HATCH Projects (Chicago, IL) and The Hyde Park Art Center Program (Chicago, IL), and a studio fellowship with Spudnik Press Cooperative. Schwartz received her MFA in Visual Arts from Washington University in St. Louis, where she was awarded the Bell Cramer Award in Printmaking, and her BA in Studio Art with a minor in the History of Art and Visual Culture from the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is currently a lecturer in the Department of Art and Architecture at Harold Washington College.
April Sheridan is a letterpress printer who is particularly interested in the artistic and experimental possibilities of the broadside and its historic place in American culture. For ten years she ran the letterpress printing, papermaking, and bookbinding studios at the Center for Book and Paper Arts at Columbia College Chicago. As an advocate for book arts education she has spoken at Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum Wayzgoose/Educators Conference, Letterpress: Forward Thinking Conference at St. Bride Library in London, and at the &Now Conference at CalArts. She currently serves on the boards of the American Printing History Association, Inland Chapter and the WasteShed and was previously assistant director of the Chicago Printers Guild.
Emily Shopp grew up in Dallas, Texas. In 2013, she received her BFA in Printmaking at Stephen F. Austin State University, where she was the 2012 recipient of the Cole Dean’s Award in Art. Shopp has been included in various juried exhibitions including the Printmaking National Exhibition at Mark Arts in Wichita, Kansas and 23rd Arts in Harmony 2018 Annual International Show in Hopkins, MN. She currently lives and works in Chicago, IL.
Much of my recent work has been ironing out all of the technical aspects of this practice. As a studio fellow I would use these techniques to develop a new, cohesive series of variable prints and collages. I plan to focus on process, composition and emotional resonance by reconfiguring representational imagery into more abstract content. I would continue to work predominantly with intaglio with chine-colle, but am also interested in the variation of texture that could come from including other print processes, such as relief and screen printing. My goal at the end of the fellowship is to create a unified body of work that blurs the boundaries between printmaking and collaging.
Veronica Siehl is an artist and printmaker based in Chicago. Siehl received her MFA in printmaking from the University of Tennessee (2010) and her BA in Studio Art from Beloit College (2006). Siehl’s work has been shown in various cities including Chicago (IL), New Orleans (LA), Poznan (Poland), Olympia (WA), and Knoxville (TN). Her multidisciplinary studio practice includes printmaking, alternative photo processes, drawing, writing and installation.
Morgan Sims received his BFA in printmaking from the University of Washington, Seattle in 2004, and MFA in Graphics from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, 2010. He often teaches at Elmhurst College and was recently a Visiting Professor at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, WA. He is a painter, printmaker, and neon artist. He shows his work in many venues locally, including recently with Bert Green Fine Art, Heaven Gallery, and Intelligentsia. He’s also shown recently in CA, WA, and NY. You can see his work at .
