Emily Howard, an Erlanger-based printmaker and illustrator, digs into the surfaces of wood and linoleum. Ink fills the spaces and creates thick, black and graphic lines. Through each new print, Howard creates a new story through visual means.
She calls her work feminine and narrative, and it’s often drawn from a story — be it one she’s read or made up on her own. The name for her artist persona and online Etsy store, The Diggingest Girl, stemmed from Howard’s favorite childhood book: Digging-est Dog by Al Perkins.
Duke the dog grew up in a pet shop and didn’t know how to dig. When he got adopted by a woman on a farm, he learned to dig too well and ended up destroying the surrounding town and had to fix his mistakes.
“That really spoke to me,” Howard says. “I wanted to learn how to do something so well like Duke the dog in the book. Digging for me is this metaphor for digging for truth and meaning in an often shallow world.”
It also takes on a literal meaning: Digging is the actual process of her work.
She wasn’t always a print maker, though she says she’s known since the age of seven that she wanted to be an artist — and that she is. As an undergrad, she majored in Fine Arts at the University of Kentucky before getting into graduate school at the University of Cincinnati’s School of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning, where she pursued a masters in Fine Arts. Finally, she went back a third time and got a degree in Arts Education — a choice she made more out of pressure than want.
“I felt that pressure to be a teacher and after I finished my Bachelor of Fine Arts at Kentucky, I didn’t want to do it. I came back home and starting working for Comm Air when they were still CVG as a ramp agent,” Howard says. “I felt like I had to get a job that was going to make me money and the art was something I had to do on the side. After a few years, it was evident that wasn’t going to cut it and I wasn’t reaching my full potential as an artist.”
The same day she was accepted into flight attendant school, she was accepted into graduate school. The choice was clear; she went to DAAP.
After graduation she worked for ArtWorks, a nonprofit that works with creative youth to create vibrant murals throughout Greater Cincinnati. Though she’s worked on several murals, this summer finds Howard working as a project manager for “Dream Big & Fly High,” a design by Sara Cormier that was chosen among 20 artist submissions for a flying pig-themed mural.
The design is being finished between 60 different panels, and the final product won’t be seen in its entirety until it’s placed on the corner of Fifth and Elm streets on the west side of the Hyatt Regency Hotel.
“It’s really challenging to be a young person who’s creative and to find opportunities to express that creativity and to get paid for it,” Howard says. “ArtWorks is a stepping stone to that; you get to work with other professionals to see how they do it.”
Throughout the year, Howard participates in about 20 shows (such as the City Flea) and averages about two per month. Though the bulk of her art is sold here, she also sells pieces on Etsy. With over 36,000 followers on Instagram, Howard’s work caught more attention than she expected.
“I thought, ‘Oh my god, there are people who really care about the work that I make with my hands,’ which is the most gratifying feeling,” Howard says. “I fully expected that the only people who would care about my work would be my parents and my grandparents.”
Depending on the size and complexity of the board she’s carving, drafting alone can take up to two hours, while carving out the image can take anywhere from two to 15 hours for larger blocks. Entire editions of prints can take up to 20 hours to finish.
Some of her most popular prints include a print of the Cincinnati Zoo’s Baby Fiona, the cutest hippo around. (Howard noted that it’s almost sold out, so grab one while you can.) Another bestseller, “The Awakening,” a now retired block, depicts a girl in a billowing dress with her face turned away framed by two curved trees.
After the election last year, she started another series of fictional saints meant to empower women.
“I was feeling really disheartened and unseen,” she says. “What I mean by that is I was starting to feel the force of what it is to be a woman in a political climate like that. It’s a scary, scary experience. I was trying to find a way for me personally to deal with all of the things that come with being a person at this time in person.
“I just thought, I wish there was an army of badass lady goddess saints that could help me along the way, because I feel that women now have a lot of the same needs that we’ve had throughout history, but a lot of needs are unique to the times we live in,” she continues.
The saints include Our Lady of Self-Love, Our Lady of Righteous Anger, Our Lady of Wildness and our Lady of Transformation.
Aside from being inspired by political and social movements, Howard says that bookworms often gravitate toward her work. She returns to collections such as Grimm’s Fairy Tales, Beautiful Angiola (sicilian folk tales) and a volume of myths and legends of the eastern band of Cherokee for their rich, visual language.
Her work is layered in metaphors, and while some are minimalistic, others are made with fine, careful details. With each motion, digging slightly into the material at hand, Howard uncovers another tale and, invariably, another part of her authentic self.
Learn more about THE DIGGINGEST GIRL at instagram.com/thediggingestgirl. To purchase pieces, visit etsy.com/shop/thediggingestgirl.
