Jasper Johns : process and printmaking Author Johns, Jasper, 1930- Date 1996 Publisher The Museum of Modern Art Exhibition URL www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/295 The Museum of Modern Art's exhibition history— from our founding in 1929 to the present—is available online. It includes exhibition catalogues, primary documents, installation views, and an index of participating artists. MoMA © 2017 The Museum of Modern Art Jasper Johns Processand Printmaking Jasper Johns Processand Printmaking I think that the picture isn't pre-formed,I think it is Johns'screative processas he recycled and refocused formed as it is made;and might be anything. his images. In a "trial proof," the image is entirely 1 —JasperJohns printed but varies in some way from the final edition, either in the color of the ink, the size and type of Great artists throughout history have turned to the paper, or the elements of the composition. By con richness of the etched line, the transparency of the trast, a "working proof" is one that an artist has lithograph,and the expressivepotential of the woodcut embellished by hand, usually beginning with an early to explore new possibilities in their work and to exam stage of the print and overdrawing with chalk, ink, ine their imagery against these varied surfaces and paint, crayon, or pencil, reevaluating images without techniques.Rembrandt, Goya, Munch, and Picassoare reworking the stone or plate. among the giants who found in the print mediums Since 1962,Johns has been precisely annotating his important aesthetic outlets that led to enormous proofs after an edition has been printed, indicating achievementsin the history of images. Jasper Johns which are trial proofs and working proofs and listing (born 1930) has been making prints since 1960, and the mediumsof any hand-appliedadditions, amassing has masteredthe mediumsof lithography,screenprint, evidence of the evolution of his printed images.The and the various etching techniques in a body of over great majority of the working proofs have been saved; three hundredprinted works. More fundamental,how Johns discarded those he felt revealed nothing about ever, is the fact that Johns has incorporated the con his working procedure and were not interesting as 2 cepts intrinsic to printmaking —reflection, reversal, independentworks. and transfer—into all aspects of his art. His prints For Johns,"Printmaking encouragesideas because have exaggerated, isolated, and compoundedthemes of the lapse of time involved The medium itself 3 addressedin his paintings. The continual intercourse suggests things changed or left out." His obses betweenJohns's printmaking and his painting is unique sion with the repetition of images in changing con in our time; understandinghis processin printmaking texts—an obsessionperfectly aligned with the capa gives insight into the central ideasof his art in general. bilities of printmaking —has inspired him to recycle Johns's painting process involves constant altera many of his plates, stones,and screens,incorporating tion and feedback as he paints out passages and them into totally new compositions. For some prints, changes others. He brings a similar approach to his such as Pinion (1963-66; ULAE 27), Johns returned prints, but in printmaking the proofing processallows to the stones of works never completed; for others, him to record the stages of an image's development: such as Flags II (1970; ULAE 86) and Decoy II Additions, subtractions,and other shifts are reflected (1971; ULAE125), rejected impressionsof previously in the extensive body of proofs that result from the completed images served as the foundation for new creation of each edition. These proofs provide a works. Occasionally,as in Fragment—According to unique and invaluable opportunity to understand What —Bent "Blue" (1971; ULAE 92), only the collage elements on the working proofs illustrate proof (fig. 1), printed on newsprint, reveals that the how prints have developed as extensions of earlier black background was an early decision. The back images. Other proofs reveal how surfaces have been ground is the only printed element in this proof; the rethought, tonal and spatial relationships reversed, areas for the cansand baseare left blank, with crayon and paper choicesresolved. additions loosely defining their form. Johns has said That prints embody the history of thought and that the dark backgroundwas important as a meansto action inherent in their creation appealsto Johns's long-held fascination with visual memory and the evolutionary process of imagemaking. The proofs of his first printed endeavors, the portfolios 0-9 (1960-63; ULAE 17-19), illustrate how he would eventually exploit this aspect of printmaking and manipulate lithography in provocative ways. All the images of the portfolios were made from the samestone, erased and reworked after each number was printed. Onone proof, Johnsbracketed areas in the background in crayon and wrote "hold" to instruct the printers to reserve this part of the stone's history for 4 the next numeral. Johns has referred to the working proofs as "thoughts, experiments, and asides" that occurred during the working 5 process. The first work for which the evo lution can be traced through an extensive body of such "thoughts" is his celebrated 1964 lithograph Ale Cans.No preliminary drawings exist for this image, making the working proofs the only clues to its pro gressivedevelopment. Ale Cansis Johns'sfirst print depicting one of his sculptures—the 1960 Painted i Bronze. The proofs illustrate his struggle Fig. 1. Working proof for Ale Cans.1964. Lithograph with crayon 5/8" with the illusionistic questions involved in additions,sheet: 26%t,x 20 (67.5 x 52.4 cm).The Museumof Mod the translation of a three-dimensionalobject to a two- ern Art, NewYork. Gift of the artist in honor ofTatyana Grosman Cover: Ale Cans.West Islip, New York: Universal Limited Art Edi 3/4" dimensional surface. Although a precise order of the tions, 1964. Lithograph, sheet: 22% x 17 (58.1 x 45.1 cm). The proofs is difficult to determine, progressionsof details Museum of Modern Art, New York. Gift of the Celeste and Armand help to establish their sequence.The first working Bartos Foundation 6 flatten out the spatial depth. It also providesa dark, ground alone that flattens the space of this painterly sombercontext for the sculpture,one which intensifies perspectivalreplication of the sculpture.As in the first its melancholic spirit. The crayon scribble over the proof, only the background is printed, indicating an outline of the left can servesas an early indication of early stage in the progression of proofs. Now, it is the pictorial devices Johns would use to define the heavily painted over with black and gray gouache.The roundedcans. The second working proof (fig. 2), hand-painted with gouacheand acrylic paints mixed with metallic powders,is the most illusionistic. It is the black back- 3 labels are delicately painted, creating the initial sense of realism. But Johns has painted shadowson the right 2 sides of the cans and base,conveying depth as though 7 the image were lit from the left. Theseand other cor Figs.2-4. Workingproofs for Ale Cans.1964.The Museumof Modern respondingdetails, such as the holes in the top of one Art, NewYork. Gift of the artist in honor ofTatyana Grosman of the cans, contribute to making this proof the most 5/s" Fig. 2. Lithograph with paint additions, sheet: 22%>x 17 (57.4 x specifictribute to Painted Bronze. 44.8 cm) In the next two proofs, the realistic depiction of Fig. 3. Lithograph with chalk and crayon additions, sheet: 22% x 3/a" 17 (58.0x45.1 cm) the sculpture has been adandoned in favor of more 5/s5/s" Fig. 4. Lithograph with ink and crayon additions,sheet: 22 x 17 abstract renderings. Shadows have been eliminated (57.5 x 44.8 cm) and the labels merely sketched in. Johns has always been interested in the different surfaces attainable tion. The right-hand label suggestsa mirror, reflecting with different mediums,and in the contrast between the left in paler, starker form. Painted Bronze is printed and hand-appliedtextures; he exploited those Johns's only sculpture to double an image, and the contrasts here. The olive cans and base are now experiments in this working proof focus on comparing printed, and a metallic ink simulates the bronze of the two labels. This juxtaposition and mirroring of like but dissimilar motifs became an important concern for Johns as he explored his vocabulary of 8 images in changingcontexts. The last working proof in the series is entirely printed, with the exception of the black crayon lines that loosely outline the image.The printed areas here are the same as those in the final, editioned print (cover). Most noticeably,Johns has returned in large part to the dimensional effects of the second proof (fig. 2). The printed labels closely resemble the painted versions of the earlier stage, though here, instead of shadows, Johns drew black lithographic crayon lines to suggestvolume. But typical of Johns, every mark of illusionism is countered by its denial. The surroundingrectangle, freely drawn and printed in black, confoundsour reading of the cansas volumetric and reinforces the two-dimensionality of the paper. Denyingthe spatial perspective,Johns created the per ceptual ambiguity characteristic of his strongestwork. This progression of "experiments and asides" is our first glimpse of Johns'sapproach to the depiction of a sculptural image on paper and reveals the complex rethinking that distinguisheshis working process. 4 Ale Cansis anomalousin Johns'sart of the 1960s. the sculpture. In the third proof (fig. 3), the ocher Typically in this period, when Johnschose to represent label has been applied with crayon, as hasthe red and objects, he escheweda drawn depiction, preferring to black scribbling. While no words are decipherable, affix the object directly to the canvas.In printmaking, the scribbling is certainly suggestive of lettering.