BGuthrie Photos: DC -- Donald W. Reynolds Center (SAAM) -- Exhibit: Multiplicity

DC -- Donald W. Reynolds Center (SAAM) -- Exhibit: Multiplicity:

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Description of Pictures: Multiplicity:
November 11, 2011 – March 11, 2012

Multiplicity features 83 works from the museum’s permanent collection by such outstanding contemporary artists as John Baldessari, John Cage, Vija Celmins, Chuck Close, R. Luke DuBois, Sol LeWitt, Brice Marden, Julie Mehretu, Martin Puryear, Susan Rothenberg, Kiki Smith, and Kara Walker. The concept of making multiple images from the same matrix has been integral to printmaking ever since the earliest prints were pulled from woodblocks and metal plates in the fifteenth century. Each impression is considered to be an original work of art.

Many of the artists in this exhibition have expanded the idea of multiplicity beyond editions of identical impressions by creating series, sequences, and images that comprise numerous parts. They explore repetition, pairing, and variations on a theme as artistic strategies. Implicit in their exploration of multiplicity is a challenge to rarity and uniqueness as determinants of value.

This exhibition brings together a selection of prints by artists for whom the concept of multiplicity in its many forms provides a touchstone for their artistic expression. These prints are the result of collaboration between the artist and professional printers who help realize the artist’s vision. They question the authority of the unique masterpiece and alter the stereotype of the artist working alone in the studio.

Nearly half of the prints included in the exhibition are recent acquisitions. Joann Moser, senior curator, selected the works in the exhibition.

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[1] SIPGMU_111109_002.JPG	[2] SIPGMU_111109_005.JPG	[3] SIPGMU_111109_009.JPG
[4] SIPGMU_111109_012.JPG	[5] SIPGMU_111109_016.JPG	[6] SIPGMU_111109_021.JPG
[7] SIPGMU_111109_027.JPG	[8] SIPGMU_111109_030.JPG	[9] SIPGMU_111109_036.JPG
[10] SIPGMU_111109_040.JPG	[11] SIPGMU_111109_044.JPG	[12] SIPGMU_111109_048.JPG
[13] SIPGMU_111109_051.JPG	[14] SIPGMU_111109_053.JPG	[15] SIPGMU_111109_058.JPG
[16] SIPGMU_111109_060.JPG	[17] SIPGMU_111109_064.JPG	[18] SIPGMU_111109_066.JPG
[19] SIPGMU_111109_070.JPG	[20] SIPGMU_111109_074.JPG	[21] SIPGMU_111109_078.JPG
[22] SIPGMU_111109_079.JPG	[23] SIPGMU_111109_084.JPG	[24] SIPGMU_111109_087.JPG
[25] SIPGMU_111109_090.JPG	[26] SIPGMU_111109_092.JPG	[27] SIPGMU_111109_095.JPG
[28] SIPGMU_111109_096.JPG	[29] SIPGMU_111109_099.JPG	[30] SIPGMU_111109_102.JPG
[31] SIPGMU_111109_111.JPG	[32] SIPGMU_111109_112.JPG	[33] SIPGMU_111109_115.JPG
[34] SIPGMU_111109_117.JPG	[35] SIPGMU_111109_120.JPG	[36] SIPGMU_111109_123.JPG
[37] SIPGMU_111109_126.JPG	[38] SIPGMU_111109_129.JPG	[39] SIPGMU_111109_131.JPG
[40] SIPGMU_111109_135.JPG

Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. SIPGMU_111109_005.JPG: Multiplicity: Multiplicity implies abundance and variation. This selection of contemporary prints from the permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum features a multiplicity of styles, techniques, and approaches artists have used over the past decades. All the prints are parts of editions and each impression is an original work of art. Many of the prints were conceives as multi-part works. There are series, sequences, groups, and composites. Repetition and juxtaposition are often integral to the artist's expression. While the art market favors the unique, the rare, and the precious, artists themselves pay little heed to these considerations as they create their prints. These prints are the result of collaboration between the artist and professional printers who help realize the artist's vision. This interaction alters the stereotype of the artist working alone in the studio and celebrates the power of collaboration.
2. SIPGMU_111109_030.JPG: View of the Hotel Well III, from the series Moving Focus, 1984–1985 David Hockney View of the Hotel Well, III is one of a group of images of the Hotel Romano Angeles in the little town of Acatlan, where he stayed when his car broke down on the way from Mexico City to Oaxaca. When he returned to Los Angeles, he told printer Ken Tyler about his experience, and Tyler encouraged him to return to the hotel and make images on Mylar, which were then transferred to a photosensitive plate back at Tyler's workshop.
3. SIPGMU_111109_036.JPG: Red Celia, from the series Moving Focus, 1984 David Hockney David Hockney created the Moving Focus series of twenty-nine prints over an extended period of time, from 1984 through 1986. In contrast to most print series, in which there is usually a cohesion of subject matter, style, and size, the Moving Focus prints include interiors, chairs, vases with flowers, views from a Mexican hotel, and portraits, all of varying sizes. What unifies the series is the artist's obsession with the depiction of space: the use of reverse perspective, the experience of being within a space, and the exploration of multipoint perspective. This series has been described as "Hockney's dialogue with Picasso." Red Celia is a portrait of Celia Birtwell, a close friend and favorite model. One of the most direct and powerful images of the series, the pose and execution of this print recall Matisse more than Picasso, perhaps a reference to the friendly rivalry between the two artists.
4. SIPGMU_111109_053.JPG: Untitled (We Will No Longer Be Seen and Not Heard), from the Untitled portfolio, 1985 Barbara Kruger Barbara Kruger's dramatic juxtaposition of found photographs and provocative text examines the representation of power in mass-media images. Using sign language, gesture, and words to create and contradict meaning, she employs language to question cultural stereotypes. Because of her feminist sympathies, one assumes the "we" of this message refers to women, but its meaning is less specific and encompasses all groups of people without power. Kruger came to art from a background in graphic design. Her work investigates the seemingly innocuous yet potentially insidious ways in which ideological messages infiltrate daily life by means of the mass media.
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