Untitled 1973

Curator: Let's take a look at this intriguing "Untitled" print from 1973 by Wilford Wayne Kimball Jr. What are your initial thoughts? Editor: Hmm, it’s like a delicate whisper. An echo of forms barely contained within that oval. A bit ghostly, almost. It reminds me of gazing at tangled twigs through fogged glass. Curator: It's fascinating how Kimball combined the clean geometry of that encompassing oval with what appears to be quite organic and perhaps improvised linework inside. Considering that this is a print, let's think about process here. Editor: Exactly, the interplay of control and chance intrigues me. It has a handmade feel but in that repetitive mark making—there's precision there in transferring that design, I am quite intrigued! What story do those marks wish to convey? Curator: This piece highlights Kimball's exploration of abstraction and printmaking techniques. Given the era, it resonates with post-war material explorations by artists like Eva Hesse, for example. We are drawn to explore both intentionality and happenstance by revealing production, not concealing. Editor: It speaks volumes of how constraints are sometimes very freeing, like having a set frame allowed him, if it did indeed provide a space to explore what lies just beyond boundaries and make way for possibilities. Curator: We see similar exploration through repetition in work of sculptors such as Donald Judd where an entire practice focused on a repetitive system and process revealed unique characteristics when observed together as a set. Here too we see an entire practice distilled down into this piece. The result being that we question art vs craft! Editor: I find myself wanting to touch the surface, to feel the paper. The textures, to decipher the depth created by that pale almost ghostly linework. Does each of those tiny threads, as simple as they seem, lead somewhere, tell a story? Maybe to lost or reimagined worlds? Or the interior of our inner self? It's captivating how such restraint inspires contemplation. Curator: Thinking about materials and Kimball's choice of printmaking really informs my reading. It connects this individual piece to broader discourses about value and artistic labor. What starts with production, then becomes distribution! Editor: Indeed! And that invites another form of viewership and production as now a new conversation begins with the viewers—one where we consider place, identity, and what is indeed meaningful. Curator: Beautifully said. It makes you wonder about the artist's intentions during a transformative period for printmaking and art generally. Editor: Definitely leaves one pondering, long after walking away. A ghost in the machine—beautiful and haunting, simultaneously.