Ifpda International Fine Print Dealers Association

Lithograph with colour screenprinting. Signed in pencil, an artist's proof aside from the edition of 150. Published by Cirrus Editions, California.

BALDESSARI, John. Choosing: Green Beans. Title-page and [2] ff. text. Illustrated with 9 colour photographic plates. 4to., 295 x 200 mm, bound in printed wrappers, in a new green and...

It is hard to characterize John Baldessari’s varied practice—which includes photomontage, artist’s books, prints, paintings, film, performance, and installation—except through his ap...

It is hard to characterize John Baldessari’s varied practice—which includes photomontage, artist’s books, prints, paintings, film, performance, and installation—except through his ap...

It is hard to characterize John Baldessari’s varied practice—which includes photomontage, artist’s books, prints, paintings, film, performance, and installation—except through his approach of good-humored irreverence. Baldessari is commonly associated with Conceptual or Minimalist art, though he has called this characterization “a little bit boring.” His two-dimensional works often incorporate found images, composed in layers or presented as distinct pieces with an element of surprise, like a brightly colored geometric shape in the place of a face or a starkly printed sardonic caption. Baldessari has demonstrated a lasting interest in language and semantics, articulating these concerns through the use of puns or the juxtaposition of seemingly unrelated images and words, as in his 1978 work Blasted Allegories. His self-referencing photomontages and use of text have been sources of inspiration for countless artists, including Cindy Sherman, David Salle, and Barbara Kruger. Baldessari identifies his own artistic lineage, saying, “I would prefer to go to the source with Duchamp rather than credit Warhol as an influence.” Hegel’s Cellar reflects Baldessari's his interests in philosophy and identity. For this series of ten aquatints, Baldessari employed stock imagery in montages to examine Hegel’s theory of an “abyss (or cellar) as a psychic space where one preserve[s] images unconsciously” (Wendy Weitman in The Prints of John Baldessari: A Catalogue Raisonne 1971–2007, 23-24). As Weitman observes, the plate titled Two Boats...