Untitled 2001

This untitled print was made by Jasper Johns using etching. I’m trying to imagine Johns in the studio, the smell of ink and acid, and how he might have gone about layering these images and textures. There are so many ways to approach an image, and in Johns’s case, it’s through a process of constant questioning. I see the cross-hatching that creates a screen-like effect, which is then juxtaposed with the ghostly image of figures that seem to float behind a veil. Maybe he's asking: How do we really see? And what is the role of memory in our perception? These are the questions that feel so incredibly alive when I'm in the studio. Johns is not just representing an image; he’s showing us how images are constructed and how they come to mean something. He’s in conversation with artists like Rauschenberg, Warhol, and Cage. All of them inspiring us to think differently and see the world anew.