Can colors have a conversation?  Do works of art “speak” to each other?  Building on recent donations to The Fralin collection, this exhibition is an exploration of how works of art visually converse, reflecting how their creators engaged with each other and became exposed to new media.  Beginning about 1970, well-established artists known for their work in painting and sculpture began experimenting in printmaking, taking their simple, abstract forms into a new medium and contrasting their stripped-down shapes and lines with intense, luminous hues.  Large-scale, color-rich painting and oversized sculpture were translated onto flat expanses of paper, but in doing so, artists began a conversation within their own work between painting, sculpture, architecture, and printmaking. 

Each artist represented here began a different conversation: between opposing colors and shapes, between their own work and that of others, between their earlier work and their new creations, between local artists and those across geographical distance, between teacher and student, between generations and cultures, and between the distant past and the present.  Many of these artists converged on the New York art scene, where they interacted with each other, but their legacy reverberates globally to a new generation of printmakers. 

These artists invite us to consider, how do the colors themselves interact with each other?  How are they interacting with you?