The 1990s saw Gemini continuing to work with artists to produce a remarkable range of prints and objects. Kenneth Price, whose earliest Gemini prints such as the Figurine Cup Series (39.1 - 39.3) date back to 1969, expanded into new territory in recent years with polychrome ceramic editions such as Chet (39.25) and California Cup (39.23). Due to their unusual form as well as their settings within wooden display boxes, these works blurred the line between vessel and sculpture. Bruce Nauman was another artist who renewed his Gemini connections in the 1990s. Nauman, who beginning in the early 1970s had completed many extraordinary word/image prints at Gemini (36.1 - 36.14), returned to create a series entitled Fingers and Holes (36.33 - 36.43) which were prints that explored gestures of the body and hand in lithographs and etchings.

Elizabeth Murray's Exile (35.2.11) and Smoke (35.2.18) are two works in a series entitled Thirty-Eight, a collection of unique collage constructions. Each piece consists of three paper elements, a figure and two base layers enlivened with a sequence of printed colors. The figure, enhanced by an embossed surface texture, was hand-cut and folded into a unique, three-dimensional configuration. Openings in the outer base layer revealed the newspaper text underneath. After these three layers were laminated, the lively contour of the base was cut out. Individual titles for each work in the series were extracted from the newspaper text. The artist applied a range of pastel, melding color, text, and surface detail. Such individualization of works in her editions is a hallmark of Murray's Gemini creations. Numerous other evocative series, both in relief construction and traditional intaglio, are embellished with the artist's hand-coloring.

The arrival of Frenchman Daniel Buren at Gemini in the last year of the 1980s paralleled a general heightened awareness of European art developments during this period. Buren's conceptualist approach incorporates installation considerations into his prints. For example, Five Out of Eleven (8.2) presents the wall as an integral part of the print. The hanging height of the panels is determined according to the wall's dimensions and the striped panels, sliced on the diagonal, expose wall through the frame to further emphasize the unity of the site and artwork. The title refers to the five colors used in this particular impression of the print, which have been selected from the eleven colors used in the entire edition. Each set of sheets is a unique arrangement, meaning that any one piece is different from that of any other within the group, thus subverting the idea of a uniform edition. During this period, Gemini also turned its attention to conceptualism close to home by working with the Californian John Baldessari. Baldessari's nine published works took advantage of the ability of lithograph and screenprint to cover broad expanses of color. This quality allowed him to cover key silhouettes of figures with flat color. Several works in the series, such as Two Bowlers (with Questioning Person) (4.6), comprises two panels, essentially splitting the print down the middle in a review of parts and wholes.

In the last year of his life, Gemini cultivated the art of Allen Ginsberg. Best known as a poet and political activist, Ginsberg worked at Gemini to create six editions of prints. One, The Ballad of The Skeletons (55.5), represents a complex and multifaceted world through a presentation of interwoven text and image. The handwritten poem gathers many polar viewpoints and is illustrated with an aggregate of drawings contributed by nine artists representing many different styles. This collective spirit, celebrating art as the product of multiple imaginations, viewpoints, and sensibilities revealed in the same entity, echoes the spirit and substance of the Gemini workshop.

Art and Technology | The 1960s | The 1970s | Robert Rauschenberg
Ellsworth Kelly | Jasper Johns | David Hockney | Sam Francis | Roy Lichtenstein
The 1980s | Jonathan Borofsky | Richard Serra | The 1990s | Towards the Future