Graphicstudio / U.S.F.

Profile

Graphicstudio is a university-based atelier engaged in a unique experiment in art and education, committed to research and the application of traditional and new techniques for the production of limited edition prints and sculpture multiples. Graphicstudio with the Contemporary Art Museum and the Public Art Program form the Institute for Research in Art in the College of The Arts at the University of South Florida.

Distinguished Professor, Donald J. Saff founded Graphicstudio in 1968 at the University of South Florida (USF). Through the years, Graphicstudio has received wide popular and critical acclaim. In 1990, an archive of Graphicstudio's publications was established at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. The National Gallery presented a comprehensive exhibition with an accompanying catalogue organized by Ruth Fine. Leading museums and collectors including the Museum of Modern Art , the Whitney Museum of American Art , the New York Public Library and the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota have acquired Graphicstudio's editions.

From its inception, the program has served a variety of constituencies. Students and faculty have derived important educational and professional benefits from contacts with visiting artists. The Subscription Program supports the research and educational programs and allows participants to collect significant art.

Ongoing research by Graphicstudio's printers and artisans has been remarkably productive and many new processes and treatments of traditional methods have been developed under the guidance of Deli Sacilotto, Director of Research. For example a means of printing encaustic waxes, called 'waxtype' was developed for Roy Lichtenstein .The woodcut process, unchanged since the 9th century, has been transformed by using photographically generated stencils thus allowing for extremely fine detail. Artis ts Jim Dine, Sandro Chia and Philip Pearlstein have used this 'heliorelief' process with exceptional results. Sacilotto's expertise expanded the 19th century photogravure process to allow for the hand printing of unusually large images as well as four-color separations. Robert Mapplethorpe , Chuck Close , Ed Ruscha, Vik Muniz and others have used the photogravure process to advance new concepts and approaches to their work.