Mixografia is pleased to participate in the IFPDA Fine Art Print Fair , exclusively on Artsy from May 13 to June 13, 2020. ON TIME features selection of editions created by Ed Ruscha in collaboration with Mixografia from 1994 – 2014.
Among Ruscha’s earliest works with Mixografia is Clock , from a series of prints created in 1994. Spectral fragments of an analog clock appear just in frame behind a veil of dry marsh grass, along the outer edges of the composition. With its hands missing, the clock is in stasis and functionally timeless. In his edition N ew Wood/Old Wood, Ruscha depicts gradual change in the form of a cut wooden plank at two distinct stages of weathering, indicating the process of aging in its warped fibers and darkening hues.
Leaving Omaha for California in the early 1960s, Ruscha became fascinated by the ubiquitous architecture stretching along U.S. Route 66. He especially noted the unremarkable variety of gas stations set against the Southwestern desert, leading to an allure for the ordinary that has held particular significance in his work ever since. In Ghost Station, Ruscha revisits the Standard Oil filling station but removes its color and thus the context of time entirely. Whereas in previous renditions of this image Ruscha uses split-fountain gradients and lighting effects to suggest atmospheric conditions and the position of the sun in the sky, he limits all formal considerations in Ghost Station to sharp lines created by cast shadows from the artwork’s low-relief impression.
In his 2014 series Rusty Signs , Ruscha renders the effects of time on these objects as one might find them in the built environment at various points of neglect and disrepair. The signs, now stripped of their use, become backdrops for messages that carry a renewed emotional resonance beyond their formerly instructional purpose.
The exhibition presents a thematic view of Ruscha’s vast and influential body of graphic works, focusing especially on the passage of time and representations of change, while also considering the broader context of history leading to pertinent themes facing the world in the present day.