Skip to main content

Main navigation

  • Visit
  • Exhibitions & Events
  • Art & Design
  • Give
  • Search

Visit Main Menu Block

  • Hours & Admission
  • Accessibility & Amenities
  • Tours & Group Visits
  • Visitor Guidelines

Exhibitions and Events Main Menu Block

  • Exhibitions
  • Events

Art and Design Main Menu Block

  • Collection
  • Collection Research
  • Past Exhibitions
  • Watch / Listen / Read

Footer Main

  • Become a Member
  • Who We Are
  • Opportunities
  • Rent the Museum
Julie Mehretu, Local Calm. Helen M. Danforth Acquisition Fund

The Primacy of Paper

Recent Works from the Collection
January 15 - June 20, 2010
Julie Mehretu, Local Calm. Helen M. Danforth Acquisition Fund

Introduction

Drawings and prints often function as key components of an artist’s practice, and in recent years, works on paper have come to challenge the primacy of painting and sculpture. The works on paper in this gallery, intended to complement the exhibition Pat Steir: Drawing Out of Line (on view February 19 through July 3 in the Chace Center gallery), share several recurrent themes that resonate with Steir’s artistic exploration, despite their varied conceptual underpinnings.

The relationship of words to images frames the work of Sol LeWitt, Edward Ruscha, and Ann Hamilton, raising questions about the difference in meaning between writing and drawing. Do words and images express substance in the same way, or do words as imagery or in combination with imagery convey something that neither could do on their own? While these works challenge conventional categories of making and knowing, other works on view question the limits of knowledge and of representation by highlighting the fine line between order and chaos. Dorothea Rockburne, Kathy Prendergast, and John Morris explore ordering systems, including mapping, geometry, and economics, both as fearful constraints and as tools that allow us to better understand the world. Finally, Jennifer Bartlett, Shahzia Sikander, Julie Mehretu and Kiki Smith assimilate the language of drawing from a variety of sources including the art-historical, infusing their works with social and personal references. To each of these artists, material concerns-whether the act and process of drawing or the special qualities of paper itself-play an essential role in the creation or open-ended expansion of meaning.

Jan Howard

Exhibition images

view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image
view exhibition image

The Primacy of Paper : Recent Works from the Collection

January 15 - June 20, 2010
Download Checklist pdf

/

Download

Footer Main

  • Become a Member
  • Who We Are
  • Opportunities
  • Rent the Museum

Footer Main Navigation

  • Visit

    • Hours & Admission
    • Accessibility & Amenities
    • Tours & Group Visits
    • Visitor Guidelines
  • Art & Design

    • Collection Research
    • Collection
    • Past Exhibitions
  • Join / Give

    • Become a Member
    • Give
  • Exhibitions & Events

    • Exhibitions
    • Events
  • Watch / Listen / Read

    • The Latest
    • Publications
    • Articles
    • Audio & Video

Footer Secondary Navigation

  • Who We Are
  • Opportunities
  • Image Request
  • Press Office
  • Rent the Museum
  • Terms of Use
Tickets
Homepage
Go to the risd.edu homepage. This link will open in a new window.