Colophon 1962

Reva Urban made this print, Colophon, at the Tamarind Lithography Workshop in Los Angeles. The whole piece has a soft, almost ghostly quality, a lot of open space, and delicate handwriting-like marks. I think that's partly what draws me in: its quietness. Looking at the paper, Rives BFK, you can almost feel the texture. The ink isn't thick or showy, but sits right on the surface, almost like a memory. I love how the text spreads out, some areas densely packed, others floating alone. The phrase "All stones and sizes have been effaced" hints at the erasure and layering that’s part of printmaking, a process of adding and subtracting. It's about embracing mistakes, like a conversation where the best parts are often the detours. Urban reminds me a little of someone like Dieter Roth, who also blurred the line between printmaking, poetry, and the raw stuff of daily life. Art is like that, a never-ending dialogue.