From Western printmaking's nebulous beginnings in religious iconography, playing cards and the images of love and romance to the present status of editioned fine art prints, offset or laser printed books and magazines, the print has been part of our culture and has repeatedly raised the question of originality versus mass production. As legend goes, when Johann Gutenberg's partner/financer Johan Fust attempted to sell books printed with Gutenberg's invention, he was accused of practicing the black arts because no one could produce exact copies of any manuscript without working for the Devil. Prints surround us in many forms and directly impact our lives. Anyone who possesses a book, magazine or a dollar bill in his pocket owns a print, and each of these is duplicated thousands if not millions of times on bookshelves, coffee tables and in wallets across the country. However, from the beginnings of printmaking there have been images that have taken on the aura of art, of originality, and of the uniquely beautiful. The great German artist Albrecht Durer produced designs for books illustrating the cycles of religious stories while also creating master prints which were sold and traded to cover his travel expenses. This exhibition will investigate the fine art print and what is required to remove an image from the commonplace to make it art.

print (print),v., print-ed, print-ing, n., adj.-v.t. 1. to produce (a text picture, etc.) by applying inked types, plates, blocks, or the like, to paper or other material either by direct pressure or indirectly by offsetting an image onto an intermediate cylinder. 2. to reproduce (a design or pattern) by engraving on a plate or block. (p. 1073, Random House Webster's College Dictionary, McGraw-Hill, 1991)

There is little doubt that we have confusion about what is a fine art print when there are twenty-four additional definitions listed. Linda C. Hults in her book The Print in the Western World says, "Defined most simply, a print is a work of art on paper, produced in multiple impressions, each of which is pulled from an inked surface. ( p. 3) Even this definition is being challenged by today's new technology and the use of the computer. One means through which prints are better understood is by medium, and within the different print media by the specific printmaking technique.

There are four traditional print media: relief prints, intaglio prints, lithography (planographic), and silkscreen (stencil). The oldest of these media is the Relief Print. The printing surface is altered through manually carving, chemically etching or mechanically creating indentations into the surface. These become the non-ink receiving surfaces, which when the plate is inked and printed remain the color of the paper. The inked image is reversed when transferred to the paper. In Western culture this type of print developed in Europe sometime around the year 1400 and corresponded with the European development of paper.

The Intaglio Print takes its name from the Italian for "incised line" and was probably the second of the print media to be developed. Debate exists whether it resulted from the techniques used by armorers or goldsmiths. In many ways it is the opposite of the relief print in that through chemical, manual or mechanical means lines and textures are made into the plate surface (copper, steel or zinc are traditionally used). It is the recessed areas that hold the ink that is eventually transferred to the paper surface after the surface ink is removed by wiping the inked plate with a starched cheesecloth known as tarlatan. After the surface ink is removed the inked plate and paper are put through the pressure of an etching press. The inked image is reversed when transferred to the paper. It is believed that the earliest intaglio prints date from the early 1400s with the oldest extant print, The Flagellation of Christ, dating from 1446.

The printing medium of Lithography was created by the struggling playwright Alois Senefelder in 1798 supposedly as an inexpensive means through which to publish his writing. He developed the process by experimenting with chemically treating images on Bavarian limestone using a combination nitric acid and gum Arabic solutions. Lithography is known as a "planographic" process because it is created on a flat surface. The printing plate is neither raised nor indented to create the image. Lithography works on the basic principle that grease, a major component of printing ink, and water repel each other. An image is created on a specially prepared plate (Bavarian limestone, zinc or aluminum), chemically treated with combinations of nitric acid and gum arabic, and then prior to inking and printing the plate is dampened. Ink adheres to the chemically-treated image areas while the dampened unmarked areas repel the ink and remain blank. This print medium also reverses the plate image when printed on the paper.

Silkscreen also called serigraphy and screen printing has its roots in the earliest periods of human history when the first cave artist blew dyes around his hand to indicate his identity on the cave wall. Screen Printing was adapted in the middle of the 20th century from commercial printing to be used as a fine art medium. It probably has its origins in China and Japan where it was used to create patterns on fabric. Using a porous material such as a silk mesh or other fabric screen, stencils of all sorts (paper, glue, photographic emulsion, etc.) block out areas of the screen and image. Using a squeegee ink is forced through the screen onto paper creating the image from the open screen areas. For multiple-color prints additional screens and colored inks are used to place layers of ink one on top of the other. Unlike the other print media, silkscreen imagery directly duplicates what is seen on the screen. Silkscreen was popularized during the Depression in the training sessions of the W.P.A. Federal Art Project when younger artists took classes in this print technique from older master artists like Anthony Velonis. After World War II it became a major medium for making fine art prints. Silkscreen became a popular medium for Pop artists like Andy Warhol and Jasper Johns and Color Field and Op artists like Ellsworth Kelly and Richard Anuszkiewicz.

THE EDITION for a fine art print is the total number of images created from a specific plate(s). Artists like Durer and Rembrandt did not distinguish between what they created individually as art and what was mass produced. They were not concerned with creating a limited edition but in creating an image that met their artistic standards and made them money. Of all printmakers Rembrandt was unique in that he would make multiple changes in a print image, printing the plate with each change resulting in a virtual visual roadmap of his creative thinking. The various stages that a print image goes through are referred to as states. Other artists such as the Italian artist Giovanni Piranesi, have many impressions created from their plates after their deaths when the plates become the property of other individuals or institutions seeking to mass-produce and sell the print images for profit. You can still purchase Piaranesi engravings in Italy that have been recently printed.

Contemporary artists often create what is referred to as a "limited edition print" that is signed, dated, numbered and titled. The artist traditionally signs his name below the print image in the lower right-hand corner. The date of the print is placed next to the artist's name. In the lower left-hand corner the title of the work is often placed. In the lower middle margin below the image the edition designation is placed. If the print is part of the regular edition the number will resemble a fraction such as 3/25. This designates that this is the third print created out of an edition of twenty-five. 10/25 would mean it was the tenth image printed out of twenty-five. For some artists the top number designates when in the printing process the image was made and the lower number refers to the total number in the edition. Some galleries will charge a higher price for prints that can be proven to be earlier in the edition.

Print collectors should beware of assuming that what they see is the total story. There are other designations that can be placed under the image that can add many prints to an edition. At times the letters "A.P." meaning "artist's proof" are placed instead of the edition number. These are prints that are the same as those in the edition but are the artist's personal property to dispose of as he/she seems fit. The total number of A.P.s is not suppose to exceed 10% of the total in the numbered edition, but that is not always the case. Additionally, in the tradition of Rembrandt prints can go through multiple states with each state printed and editioned.

Other terms that can appear under a print include bon a tirer proof which is the first print pulled in an edition and the visual standard by which subsequent prints are deemed suitable to be in the edition. Additionally, there is the cancellation proof where the print image is purposely damaged and printed showing to the collector that the image cannot be re-editioned at a future time. When purchasing prints always ask how many total impressions have been pulled (printed) from the plate(s) that comprise the print. There can be multiple editions, many A.P.s, and even unnumbered impressions that comprise that number. Reputable dealers will give a guarantee as to the total.

An important designation within the world of the fine art print is that between an original work of art that happens to be a print and the reproduction. There has been confusion in this issue from the very beginnings of printmaking. Artist such as Raphael (1483-1520), hired printmakers such as Marcantonio Raimondi to make engravings copying his paintings. The purpose was to produce a more marketable product that could be financially rewarding. Thus was born the reproduction. A reproduction is a copy made from an original work of art for the purpose of mass production. It is made with the approval of the owner of the image whether that be the artist, an art museum or a gallery. It is not intended to fool the art collector and often gives some form of notification on the print surface that it is a reproduction. The small offset lithograph by Grant Wood in the exhibition has in its margin the letters REPRO. Early reproductions such as those created by Raimondi can be very valuable.

As prints became more valuable a less acceptable form of reproduction developed, the print forgery. A print forgery is an image that attempts to copy the work of a known and collectable artist/printmaker for the purpose of deceiving the buying public. This practices dates back to the time of Albrecht Durer who was incensed over copies made of his prints that were sold as his work. William Hogarth (1697-1764), was so vexed by the problem that he led the move in England for copyright laws to protect his prints and paintings.

Master printmaker & the master printer are terms that may confuse some. Because of the technical nature of printmaking some artists who may work in a variety of artistic media seek a technical assistant who has mastery in a printmaking media. This assistant is the master printer. From types of paper, ink quality and viscosity, the proper concentration of nitric acid and gum arabic in a lithography etch, to exposure times with photo emulsions, all of these and more are technical issues that can impact the quality of the print image. The need for such assistance led to the creation of print workshops or ateliers after World War II. Landfall Press, Tamarind and Echo Press have all served this function. Some prints will have signatures from both the artist and the printer. Other artists are so well versed in the printmaking media that they do not need technical assistance and are often responsible for advances in a printmaking media. These are the master printmaker. They are often professors at colleges and universities and share their knowledge of printmaking with younger aspiring student/ artists.