Printmaking In America

The years from 1960 to 1990 witnessed an extraordinary outburst of creative activity among American printmakers. A number of important new workshops were founded, from such influential studios as Universal Limited Art Editions as Long Island and the Tamarind Lithography Workshop in Los Angeles to small presses throughout the country. In contrast to traditional European ateliers, where professional printers reproduced artists' designs for commercial edition printing, the new American workshops stressed collaboration, and emphasized radical experimentation with medium and process. The work produced in these studios often owed as much to the imaginative gifts of the printer as the conception of the artist.