when in Boston, come see the show I helped on....
(Sol LeWitt)

Sets, Series, and Suites: Contemporary Printmaking
January 19, 2005–May 30, 2005
Torf Gallery

Andy Warhol’s four Flowers (1974) flirt with camp and kitsch. Drawn in Warhol’s deliberately casual scribbling line, these 1950s-flavored “artistic” arrangements are brought to edgy, electric life by hand-coloring with transparent dyes that often have a neon intensity.
By Clifford Ackley
Ever since the 1890s, when Monet produced his influential serial paintings of cathedrals and haystacks, modern artists have been stimulated by the idea of working in series. From Kandinsky woodcuts, to Warhol silkscreens, to Winters linocuts, twentieth-century artists use prints to explore serial repetition.

Drawn from two extraordinary private collections and the Museum’s holdings, this exhibition investigates theme and variation in sixty original print series and portfolios by contemporary European and American artists active since 1960. It’s a dazzling array of works—ranging from matched pairs of two to series of twenty-five—by more than fifty artists working in a wide spectrum of print media.

From more representational works (Andy Warhol flowers, Vija Celmins landscapes, Roy Lichtenstein mirrors, and Richard Estes urban architecture), to geometric or gestural suites from major figures of abstract art (Sol LeWitt, Brice Marden, Dorothea Rockburne, and Ellsworth Kelly), “Sets, Series, and Suites” proves the whole is indeed greater than the sum of its parts.

Clifford Ackley is chair, Department of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs, and Ruth and Carl Shapiro Curator of Prints and Drawings.