George Wietor: Rizo art star in our backyard

This city is full of so many people that it is often hard in all the hustle and bustle to recognize a true rising star in our community.

Rising would imply that one is ascending, and so I must say that, having known local artist, curator, publisher, and organizer for more than a decade now,there is no other way to describe the person of George Wietor.

Not only has Wietor been a part of our city’s evolving art scene and on so many platforms from co-founding the Division Avenue Arts Collective (DAAC), a DIY music and visual art facility/platform, to assisting artists realize their vision via his company Issue Press. 

On Monday night, Wietor will kick off a series of events in our city starting with a public lecture from Grand Valley State University’s Department of Visual & Media Arts. 

Wietor is a graduate of Grand Valley’s Film and Video Production program, and over the last 15 years has helped shape a new cultural landscape within and outside of Grand Rapids via his local run, but internationally known Issue Press, which employs the use of Risograph printers to produce art books and zines. 

As a leader in the advancement of this type of printing, Wietor has created real buzz within design circles, museums, and art schools around the world with our local renaissance man being invited as the keynote speaker at the first RISO biennale at the Jan van Eyck Academie in the Netherlands (later returning to participate in a week-long version of the biennale in 2016).

This last March, Wietor conducted a three-day workshop at Duplica 2017 in São Paulo, Brazil. 

Issue Press may not be a household name here, but many of his publications have been included in major art book fairs from New York to Norway. 

The lecture is on Monday, but other events will be  held throughout the week including a workshop and an open house of his studio in the Tanglefoot building. Please visit this link for the complete list of events.