The Artist and the Printer

The common link between the lithographs in this exhibition, which date from 1966 to 1981, is the printer – Fred Genis. The partnership of artist and lithographic printer has a long and distinguished history. Associations such as those between the printer, Auguste Clot and the artists, Toulouse-Lautrec, Bonnard and Vuillard were crucial to the development of colour printing in France at the end of the nineteenth century. It was Thomas Way the printer who introduced Whistler to the further possibilities of lithography while the unprecedented demands made by Picasso, on the Mourlot Workshop extended the recognized limits of the medium. A continuation of this tradition is seen in the work of the printer, Fred Genis.

The group of works in this exhibition closely relates to his travels and to his collaboration with various artists on three continents and in particular to his work during the late ‘sixties, in U.S. lithographic workshops – a period now seen as marking a renaissance in lithography there. The works do not therefore constitute a history of lithography in the mid-twentieth century, though examples by some of the greatest contemporary exponents of the art are represented and several key works of the period are included.

Rather less than half of Fred Genis’s total collection of printer’s proofs is shown in this exhibition. By custom, the printer is given a proof of every edition he pulls. These are not trial proofs but are in all ways identical with, and taken at the same time as, the numbered edition. Some are given to the artist for his own keeping, and the printer’s proof is often personally dedicated to the printer by the artist. It represents a token perhaps of the close alliance which exists between the two after they have worked together through all the vicissitudes of creative processes. It is also a mark of their interdependence.

Extract from The Artist and the Printer, National Gallery of Victoria, July 1982