Diego Lasansky is an accomplished printmaker and painter from Iowa City, who at the age of 21 held his first solo exhibition at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art. Still in his 20's, his paintings and prints evoke the work of famous old master artists, but are executed with a thoroughly modern twist and in his own unique, preternatural style.
Accomplished in the art of intaglio printmaking, Diego continues in his family legacy. His grandfather, Mauricio Lasansky, established the printmaking department at the University of Iowa in the 1940’s and was named "the nation’s most influential printmaker" by Time magazine in 1960.
His uncle, Tomás Lasansky, is also a widely admired printmaker from whom Diego credits with modelling the life of a professional artist and cementing his own decision to become an artist. Diego worked in his uncle’s studio through his teenage years, learning building skills necessary to manage a studio in addition to honing his own artistic techniques. He continued his education at the University of Iowa where he earned a BFA degree in 2016.
Among numerous other projects, Diego is currently completing a series of self-portraits and a complex intaglio print of Rembrandt. He is also working on a series of 16 mixed-media, large-scale paintings and drawings of samurai soldiers at his live-in studio in Iowa City, which houses his grandfather’s 200-year-old printing press.
Listen to our conversation here about how intaglio printmaking is performed, why the human portrait is endlessly fascinating, and how historical events of the past inspire him.
You can learn more about Diego and his artwork on his website, and take a virtual tour through his studio and watch him at work creating prints of his well-known Martin Luther series here. Wise beyond his years, a conversation with Diego Lasansky is endlessly fascinating.
