Jasper Johns: In Press: The Crosshatch Works and the Logic of Print

Centering on “The Dutch Wives” (1975), a double-panel encaustic-and-newsprint painting in the artist’s signature “crosshatch” motif, this catalogue explores the impact of print on the work of Jasper Johns (born 1930). The two panels of “The Dutch Wives” are imperfect duplicates of each other--a reminder that the process of the mechanical reproduction of words and images is never quite perfect. The book examines the concepts of “print” and “the press” in terms not only of printmaking and Johns’ celebrated experiments in that medium, but also in informational terms, tracing his frequent use of newsprint and its material, temporal, political, and formal implications. The publication also features prints and drawings by Johns that help demonstrate the aspects of printmaking that inform his entire oeuvre: repetition, reversal, indexicality, layering, sequencing and topology.