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In partnership with the UIC Disability Cultural Center.

This virtual tour takes you through Press & Pull: Two Decades at the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop, a survey exhibition marking 20 years following the passing of its founder, artist, educator, and master printer Robert Blackburn (1920–2003). Essye Klempner and Jazmyne Catasús, co-directors of the EFA Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop, join us to discuss the history and technical innovation that have made it the oldest and continuously operating cooperative workshop in the US. Our staff will offer detailed verbal descriptions of select pieces, discussing various printmaking techniques alongside the history of printmaking in Chicago.

ACCESS INFORMATION: This program is free and open to the public. CART (live captions) and ASL will be available on Zoom. We’ll have a camera connecting our virtual audience to the gallery. Descriptions of objects will be integrated into the presentation. For questions and access accommodations, email gallery400engagement@gmail.com.

ABOUT

Jazmine Catasús is Artistic Director and one of the Master Printers of the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop (RBPMW) at the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts (EFA). She has been involved with EFA RBPMW since 2013. Catasús works with community members and the public within the printshop facilities and the archive. She has collaborated on printmaking projects with artists such as Lizanina Cruz, Kameelah Janan Rasheed, and Dindga McCannon. Catasús has led printmaking workshops at several institutions, including the Center for Contemporary Printmaking (Norwalk, CT), Print Center New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York.

Essye Klempner is a co-Director of EFA Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop. For nearly a decade, she has led their residency and educational program, partnerships with colleges, museums, and institutions; and activated their archives of over 20,000 prints; and most recently, initiated the Blackburn Oral History Project funded by Hauser and Wirth Institute. She earned an MFA from Rutgers University’s Mason Gross School of the Arts, NJ, and a BFA from the School of Visual Arts, NYC. She has been an artist-in-residence at Woodstock, NY’s Byrdcliffe Guild; Hunter College in New York City; St. Mary’s College of Maryland; and East 40 Garden and Ceramic residency at Northampton Community College. She has exhibited at Hunter College, Rutgers University, the RISING URBANIST Conference, and Queens Museum’s Queens International: 2018 Biennial, Volumes.