Chess Piece Cards | Dark Set | Jaime Wing

Chess Piece Greeting Cards – Dark Set
Set of 6 Original Block Printed 4-Bar Greeting Cards
Royal Blue Ink on Bright White Cardstock

Jaime Wing

I have been a wood block and letterpress printmaker for a handful of years, and I began this chess quest within my comfort zone: carving wood blocks of each type of chess piece.  I thought greeting cards would make lovely little objects, the way chess pieces themselves often are.  In these small prints, I intended the grain of the wood to lend a tactile and almost ancient feel to the icons, inviting the viewer to pick them up and interact with them as they would a game piece.

I haven’t played chess since I was a child and I am far from a chess expert.  Casual players know that a pawn can be “promoted”, but while I was researching chess for the project I learned that a pawn actually has the potential to become any other piece (besides the king, of course).  A pawn, regarded as unimportant and lacking autonomy by definition, holds a powerful possibility within him/her/them.

This piece is currently at Maine Craft Portland as part of The Craft Maker’s Gambit Exhibition.