The Print Center: An Interview with Ashley Peel Pinkham

Sage Dawson: The Print Center was founded in 1915! Its mission as a non-profit is broad and includes an exhibition program, educational programs, artist representation through the gallery shop, and internships. What did I miss?

Ashley Peel Pinkham: I like that you refer to our mission as ‘broad’. Most people think it is fairly focused and perhaps too focused! The Print Center only exhibits contemporary printmaking and photography but that was not always true. When we were founded in 1915, we only exhibited printmaking and we showed new and old works. It wasn’t until the 1960s that we included photography into our mission even though our first photo show was in 1933 called Exhibition of Photographs of Garden Spots in the Congested and Built Up Section of Philadelphia. Quite the title! I certainly wish I could see these photographs today and see what ‘congested’ meant to a Philadelphian in the 1930s.

SD: It’s interesting to hear about an early exhibition highlighting plant life and urban planning in Philadelphia. How does The Print Center see itself in relation to the local community and city space today?

APP: I can’t say that The Print Center necessarily seeks out programming on or about the City, but I guess it is inevitable. Three of our staff members live in Philadelphia and are all transplants from various places in the country. I think we have a different viewpoint of the city than people who were born and raised here, so we tend to think more about urban living and the impacts on us personally. These viewpoints have been extracted either consciously or unconsciously through exhibitions such as Daniel Traub’s 2010 solo exhibition Lots that featured an extensive body of work documenting Philadelphia’s decaying vacant lots. The group exhibition Stalking the Wild Asparagus brought together different photographers that document alternative societies in rural and wilderness settings in the United States. All of the artists had some sort of tie to these groups of people – either they grew up off the grid or currently live in these intentional communities. Another example is Emma Wilcox’s 2012 solo exhibition, Where it Falls, which dealt with issues of eminent domain in Newark, NJ. This work resonated with a lot of locals because of Newark’s relationship to NYC paralleling with Camden, NJ’s relationship to Philadelphia.

In 2009, The Print Center had a large group show of photographs called the Streets of Philadelphia which featured work from 1970-1985. This was the first overview of street photography that was made in Philadelphia during an era which was critical in forging the city’s contemporary identity. Again, as someone who didn’t grow up here or live in Philadelphia at that time, it is interesting for us to look at that work to understand where this City has come from and where it is going.

We see ourselves as an organization that fosters artists. Our staff is accessible and available. We want to help artists in any way we can help. We also see ourselves as an organization that fosters collectors and general art lovers. It’s okay to come in and look at work, to discuss it, to talk to and engage with the staff. A lot of our programs are based on this, including Open Door where we bring people to other organizations for behind the scene tours. This may seem counterintuitive to bring people away from our galleries, but it has been a great way for us to get to know our audience. The Print Center staff, Board members, members, artists, strangers, etc. are all experiencing something new together. There is no hierarchy – we are all just people learning about something in our fabulous city!

SD: Can you tell me more about the exhibition program and the curatorial process at The Print Center?

APP: Since 2000, The Print Center has been fortunate enough to have a full time professional curator – something that most small- to medium-sized galleries do not have. This was a commitment from our staff, Board of Governors and funders to truly elevate the programming and exhibitions in both depth and size and create a long term vision for the gallery. Previously it was a combination of staff and a Program Committee that was making curatorial decisions.

SD: The Print Center has historically supported not just established artists, but also emerging ones, right?

APP: Artist members can submit work for consideration for an exhibition or our Curator, John Caperton, can actively go out and seek an artist he is interested in working with. John sets up a lot of studio visits and portfolio reviews and is also out in the community and beyond so he sees a lot of work.

Historically, The Print Center has always been about emerging and established artists alike. One thing that I think is unique about The Print Center is that it was founded by a group of print collectors rather than artists. These collectors wanted to create a center where they could share what they were collecting, see what others were collecting and give opportunities to artists to share their work. The Board and staff would travel all over the United States and abroad to seek out new work and new artists to bring back to Philadelphia. Fostering and mentoring artists has long been core to our mission as well. This is still true today. Our galleries allow for up to three exhibitions at one time so that we will often have one established artists exhibiting next to two emerging artists. Visitors might come for the ‘big name’ artist but get to experience work by emerging artists they might have never seen.

SD: Do any past exhibitions stand out as particularly innovative or most engaging to the public?

APP: I have worked at The Print Center for 13 years so I have seen many amazing exhibitions come and go. Here are just a few highlights of my time here:

Guerrilla Girls: Girls on Politics in 2000 – not only was this an amazing show of the Guerrilla Girls’s print work, they came and did a free performance in the galleries. It was so crowded on our second floor, we had to have a closed circuit TV on the first floor for people to watch!

IMPRINT: A Public Art Project in 2002 – this was the first show that really put The Print Center on the ‘curatorial map’. We commissioned six artists, 3 local (James Mills, Susan Fenton & Virgil Marti) and 3 national (Dotty Attie, Kerry James Marshall & John Coplans) to make work for billboards, bus shelters, coffee cups and magazine inserts for The Philadelphia Inquirer. The work was amazing and on top of that we launched a new logo, new website and all new printed materials. It was a real fresh start for The Print Center. This was the first exhibition that we received funding from the Philadelphia Exhibitions Initiative.

Taken with Time: A Camera Obscura Project in 2006 – we commissioned 3 internationally known artists (Ann Hamilton, Vera Lutter & Abelardo Morell) to come to Philadelphia, build camera obscuras and produce new work to be on view in our galleries. This exhibition was very challenging with all of the logistics of shooting schedules, permission to use spaces to photograph in, and every other detail. We were working with SEPTA, Amtrak, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Rosenbach Museum & Library and area churches and meeting spaces. It was great to see how three different artists approached the same concept in different ways. This was another exhibition funded by the Philadelphia Exhibitions Initiative.

Daniel Heyman: Abu Ghraib Detainee Interview project in 2007 – Daniel is a truly gifted printmaker who had an amazing chance to travel to Turkey to take part in interviewing the former Abu Ghraib prison detainees as part of the deposition. Invited by the lead attorney (Susan Burke) on the case, he recorded their testimonies backwards directly onto metal etching plates surrounding beautifully drawn portraits of each person. The stories were horrifying but necessary to be heard. He made color etchings from the plates and also hand-stenciled additional testimonies onto the gallery floor in a traditional prayer rug design pointed towards Mecca. To coincide with the exhibition, we were also able to invite Susan Burke to speak about her experiences and the case she was still actively working on as well as a Philadelphia premier of Ghosts of Abu Ghraib by Rory Kennedy.

SD: That’s an impressive line up. What imagery did the artists come up with for IMPRINT: A Public Art Project ? Did the artists collaborate or work independently?

APP: Joan Wadleigh Curran (one of our Board members) and Jacqueline van Rhyn (our former curator) were the co-curators for IMPRINT. The six artists were selected based on their varying approaches to printmaking and photography, the use of printed images in their work, and the issue-related content of their work. Each artist presented work that was consistent with the work they were already doing so they did not work collaboratively and there wasn’t one theme other than making the work accessible to the public. Some of the imagery was pretty tough including John Coplans’ self portraits of his naked, aging body and Dotty Attie’s provocative image and text-based work that hinted at conversations of rape and women’s rights. Other work was more playful like Virgil Marti’s beautiful utopian images of rainbows and bonsai trees and James Mills’ purely text-based work like his bus shelter that just read “blah, blah, blah.” I loved his ingenious scaled down billboard sculpture that we had on view in the galleries that said “Catalogue Available”. Of course we had an exhibition catalogue available but it was his commentary on art vs. commerce.

SD: Of emerging artists exhibited at The Print Center, can you share about a couple that stand out?

APP: Yeah, I previously mentioned some ‘heavy hitters’ in the art world, but we do mainly exhibit emerging artists so I have plenty to choose from. I already mentioned Daniel Heyman. Isaac Tin Wei Lin made an eye-mazing (yes, I just said that) installation in 2010 called One of Us. He wallpapered an entire gallery with eye-popping silkscreens – walls, floors and windows – as well as giant cat sculptures throughout the gallery space. Viewers could wear 3-D glasses to see the show, but it was vibrant enough for me without the glasses. The work was inspired by current events, Islamic calligraphy and cartoons.

Our current exhibition, Cross Pollination by Talia Greene is also a site specific installation for The Print Center. She turned our first floor gallery into a buzzing beehive with printed wallpaper made up of photographic elements such as stamen, pollen and bee parts. I love that she thought of every nook and cranny of the space and played with every inch. She even placed some bees in other parts of our building so hopefully part of her exhibition will live on long after her show comes down.

SD: I believe The Print Center is associated, in some way, with the Philadelphia Museum of Art. What’s the relationship?

APP: The Print Center has enjoyed a long and fruitful relationship with the Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMA) since our founding. This relationship was further bonded in 1942 when The Print Center donated its print collection to the PMA’s print department when it did not have designated funds for print acquisitions. Their department had just gotten underway and had only recently hired its first print curator, Carl Zigrosser, in 1940. Since this time we have continued to build on the collection through our Annual International Competition, now in its 87^th year. The print and photo curators from the PMA select at least one piece from our competition annually to be added to the collection. We also have a curator from the prints and photo department who sits on our Board of Governors as an ex officio member. Shelley Langdale, Associate Curator of Prints and Drawings, currently does so.

SD: The Artists-in-Schools Program (AISP) is one of The Print Center’s educational programs and teams artists with public schools to offer printmaking and photography curriculum. How is the curriculum developed and who are the participating artists?

APP: Each semester we develop a curriculum based thematically on an exhibition on view. Then each artist-teacher develops their own projects based on the overarching curriculum. All of the classes come to see the exhibition that the curriculum is based on. For instance, we did an exhibition called Streets of Philadelphia: Photography 1970-1985. Each class then created projects based on their own views of Philadelphia. Our artist-teachers are all practicing artists and they are encouraged to pursue their own interests and develop their studio practices in the classroom. So the resulting projects, all of which come out of the shared theme, can be quite diverse.

SD: Are there any AISP projects that stand out over the last ten years?

APP: Each year we organize a public exhibition of the students’ work, which they can come to with their families. For the last two years this has been at the artist space Little Berlin in Philadelphia. These are always a highlight for the year. Additionally, some classes have created public installations in their schools, which generate a lot of attention and start conversations on all kinds of topics. We are now working to supplement the program by having visits from artists outside of Philadelphia. Last year, Drive-By Press, a mobile printmaking workshop housed in a van, did a week-long residency, creating prints at each of the schools we were working with.