Book Description

From Process to Print: Graphic Works by Romare Bearden celebrates the etchings, aquatints, collagraphs, photo projections, lithographs, and screenprints of one of America's most important twentieth-century artists. From Process to Print accompanies the traveling exhibition of the same title organized by the Romare Bearden Foundation, a New York-based nonprofit organization established in 1990 to preserve, perpetuate, and make publicly accessible Bearden's rich artistic and intellectual legacy through its programs. More than seventy-five full-color reproductions demonstrate Bearden's printmaking process as he worked and reworked particular images, themes, and techniques; illuminate how his thinking and approaches were shaped through collaborations with master printmakers, especially Robert Blackburn; and evidence Bearden's extraordinary facility for weaving into every art form a rich tapestry of literary, biblical, mythological, popular-culture, and Western and non-Western themes that were informed by his African American cultural experiences. Included are prints based on collages, such as the Odysseus series and The Piano Lesson. Also featured are his highly acclaimed works The Family and The Train, which Bearden reworked in several media through photographic processes and changes in technique, scale, and color. The essay by Mary Lee Corlett thoroughly examines Bearden's graphic oeuvre, discussing the artist's methods and revealing him as a fearless experimenter and innovator in various print techniques. Interviews with renowned printmakers Mohammad Omer Khalil and Kathleen Caraccio, both of whom worked with Bearden, offer valuable insights into the artist's methods.