New Ground: Jacob Samuel
and Contemporary Etching
MoMA, New York
October 29, 2023 – March 16, 2024
Barry McGee
Untitled from Drypoint on Acid, 2006
Etching and aquatint with chine collé and
collage addition from a portfolio of seven drypoints
with chine collé (three with collage additions),
one drypoint and aquatint with chine collé and collage additions,
one etching with chine collé and spraypaint additions,
and one etching and aquatint with chine collé
and collaged screenprint additions.
Composition and sheet: 7 13/16 x 6 3/8″ (19.8 x 16.2 cm).
Ann and Lee Fensterstock Fund
The Museum of Modern Art, New York
© 2022 Barry McGee
Wangechi Mutu
Untitled from Eve, 2006.
Etching and aquatint with collage additions
from a portfolio of five etchings
(two with aquatint and collage additions,
one with collage additions) and three aquatints
(two with collage additions)
Composition (irreg): 8 9/16 x 5 1/2″ (21.7 x 14 cm);
sheet: 10 7/16 x 7 7/8″ (26.5 x 20 cm).
Linda Barth Goldstein Fund
The Museum of Modern Art, New York
© 2022 Wangechi Mutu
Untitled from 1999, 1999
One from a portfolio of twelve etching, drypoint,
and aquatints with chiné colle (one with blind embossing)
Plate: 5 5/16 × 7 5/8″ (13.5 × 19.4 cm);
sheet: 13 3/4 × 15 1/8″ (35 × 38.4 cm)
Acquired through the generosity of John Baldessari,
Catie and Donald Marron, and Mary M. and Sash A. Spencer
The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
© 2022 Jannis Kounellis
The Museum of Modern Art presents New Ground: Jacob Samuel and Contemporary Etching, a focused exhibition on the work of master printer and publisher Jacob Samuel (American, b. 1951). The exhibition highlights Jacob Samuel’s championing of the foundational printing technique of etching, his innovative approach to collaborating with contemporary artists, and works that push the limits of the medium. MoMA began acquiring works published by Jacob Samuel in 1988 and, three decades later, it holds his entire catalogue of more than 60 projects. New Ground selectively draws from this expansive body of work by a diverse range of artists, including Mona Hatoum, Rebecca Horn, Jannis Kounellis, Wangechi Mutu, Barry McGee, and Christopher Wool.
Over the course of four decades, Jacob Samuel collaborated with more than 60 artists, traveling extensively to do so. Through a traditional but maximally flexible approach, he was driven to prove that etching could be a successful contemporary medium. The exhibition will draw from a range of these collaborative projects. For example, Jacob Samuel made it possible for the artist Rebecca Horn to avoid working in reverse, generally considered a requirement in printmaking, by printing her delicate webs of red lines on custom-made transparent paper, which was ultimately inverted. Moreover, his design and use of a portable aquatint box allowed him to travel to artists’ studios, which allowed Jannis Kounellis to use sculptural processes, not easily transferred to a printshop setting, on copper etching plates. But this belief in traditional processes did not prevent him from embracing other techniques in order to achieve an artist’s vision. Works by Wangechi Mutu and Barry McGee include elements of collage, and are trimmed to the image size, without the expected borders of a printed image. Successive projects with Christopher Wool over the course of over twenty years are particular evidence of a generative partnership. New Ground highlights Jacob Samuel’s breadth of knowledge, historical expertise, and unwavering commitment, which made him an ideal partner for artists new to the medium.
Untitled from hair there and every where, 2004
One from a portfolio of ten etchings with chine collé.
Plate: 7 7/8 x 6 7/8″ (20 x 17.5 cm);
sheet: 16 x 14″ (40.6 x 35.6 cm).
Carol and Morton H. Rapp Fund
The Museum of Modern Art, New York
© 2022 Mona Hatoum
Untitled from Black Sun:
The Brief Transit and Violent Eclipse of Harry Crosby, 2013
One from a portfolio of eight etchings with drypoint, roulette,
aquatint, and chine collé. Plate: 7 13/16 × 6 7/8″ (19.9 × 17.4 cm);
sheet: 16 15/16 × 15″ (43 × 38.1 cm).
Acquired through the generosity of John Baldessari,
Catie and Donald Marron, and Mary M. and Sash A. Spencer.
The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
© 2022 Charline von Heyl
Untitled from 8 Etchings, 2014
One from a portfolio of eight etchings with chine collé.
Plate: 8 3/4 × 7 13/16″ (22.3 × 19.9 cm);
sheet: 15 15/16 × 13 15/16″ (40.5 × 35.4 cm).
Acquired through the generosity of John Baldessari,
Catie and Donald Marron, and Mary M. and Sash A. Spencer.
The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
© 2022 Jonas Wood
and Contemporary Etching, on view at
The Museum of Modern Art from October 29, 2023,
through March 16, 2024.
Photo: Jonathan Dorado
Born and raised in Santa Monica, California, JACOB SAMUEL began his career as a master printer for the Abstract Expressionist painter Sam Francis. Having worked extensively on Francis’s monumental, multicolour aquatints for eighteen years, Jacob Samuel was drawn instead to publish a very different type of work under his own name: small scale, serial, and generally printed in a single tone. A continually expanding network of friends and creators made introductions, and Jacob Samuel began to work with some of the most influential artists of the 20th and 21st century. He collaborated with painters, sculptors, performance artists, and musicians to make etchings that reflected their overall artistic practices. Despite the diverse range of artists, certain common themes arise with consideration of Jacob Samuel’s imprint as a whole: the depiction or impression of the body on a printing matrix, for example, or a system of images that unfolds across multiple sheets of paper. Many of the projects include texts written by the artists, a further invitation to close looking. As with everything published by Jacob Samuel, each project has a custom-designed housing that expands the work’s presence into three dimensions. The breadth, variety, and, above all, creativity in the works he published with an exceptional list of artists is evidence of his success in bringing the tradition of old master printmaking to contemporary artistic practices.
The exhibition is accompanied by the first publication dedicated to the work of the master printer Jacob Samuel. The richly illustrated catalogue features an essay by curator Esther Adler, interviews with a dozen of the artists Jacob Samuel has worked with, and a highly researched checklist detailing every project published by Jacob Samuel.
New Ground: Jacob Samuel and Contemporary Etching is organized by Esther Adler, Curator, and Margarita Lizcano Hernandez, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Drawings and Prints.
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