Water is the new oil is west Texas:

The landscape is changing and water is the new commodity in west Texas.

This poster depicts the water shortage in west Texas due in large part to the drought scarcity, and the current demand for large amounts of water to be used in the fracking process. Some small west Texas towns are literally drying up with their water being sold to drill for natural gas.

The two color 30” x 40” letterpress poster utilizes a hand-carved linoleum background. Looking like oil derricks at first glance the water tower silhouette images overprint the background using polymer plates.

Two hand-mixed custom inks are hand brayer-ed directly on the images then the paper is laid on top and the press is hand cranked trough producing a unique image one at a time on a 1960 “Charles Brand” etching press that had been converted to a letterpress.

The intended result is a visual narrative sans words that hopefully will give the participant cause to reexamine the issue.

This poster was produced for retail sales and public exhibitions.