Alexis Audette graduated from the RISD Textiles MFA program in 2003, and designs Mazy Path, a line of botanical wallpapers and textiles based on her handmade linocut prints. She also makes linocuts as works of art. Audette creates her prints by hand using water-based inks and Japanese mulberry paper at her studio in New York City. The subtle variations that result from hand printing make each print one of a kind.

Like her wallpapers and textiles, Audette’s prints explore remarkable plants through the lenses of environmental journalism and art history. Trees that mine for heavy metals, mushrooms that create forest communication networks, grasses that fortify soil to increase grain yields: these are some of the botanical wonders that inspire her work. To capture the dynamism of these motifs, Audette looks to early Modernists, such as Arthur Wesley Dow and Josef Frank, for ideas around composition and color.

Audette’s goal is to create captivating botanical images that are conversation starters. She strives to keep plants top of mind and on the tongue because what occupies our thoughts, and what we name out loud, is what we care about. In other words, thinking and talking about plants is the first step toward improving our relationship with the natural world.