Graphic Masters features groundbreaking and timeless artists who worked in the medium of printmaking over its 500-year history, and will be the Seattle Art Museum’s first exhibition devoted to the graphic arts. Shown in juxtaposition with a masterwork by one of the seminal graphic artists of our time, the exhibition will feature 400 objects.
Albrecht Dürer, Francisco Goya, and Pablo Picasso">Pablo Picasso are among the artists who considered printmaking a primary form of expression and experimentation. Dürer’s ambitious Large Woodcut Passion (1497/1510) was one of the first projects to emancipate printmaking from book production and create a market for a new level of collector. Goya’s renowned Caprichos (1799) combined word and image to satirize injustices and corruption in 18th-century Spanish society. In the Vollard Suite (1930-37), Picasso exploited the versatility of the etching medium to create extensive variations on the theme of artist and model.
Visitors can also explore other milestone print series including William Hogarth’s The Harlot’s Progress (1733) and The Rake’s Progress (1735) and Jazz (1947) by Henri Matisse">Henri Matisse, as well as individual print masterpieces by Rembrandt van Rijn.
The final works in the exhibition are over 200 drawings for The Book of Genesis by celebrated graphic artist R. Crumb. This ambitious contemporary take on the historical tradition of printed book illustrations offers a fresh and original reading of well-known stories and shows how his graphic language goes back to the woodcuts that began the exhibition. The exhibition is organized by the Seattle Art Museum.
Special exhibitions at SAM are made possible by donors to:
Generous SupportArtsFund/Guendolen Carkeek Plestcheeff Fund for the Decorative and Design Arts
Hotel SponsorHotel 1000
Special thanks to Fundación ICOThe Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters: of The Caprices (detail), 1799, Francisco Goya, Spanish, 1746–1828, Private Collection.
