11th Turner Museum National Print Competition & Exhibition, "Currency"

The Janet Turner Print Museum at CSU, Chico, Chico CA has existed since 1981 with a sole focus of the history of printmaking as a resource for public exhibitions, student study and scholarly research. Beginning in 1995, the biennial national print competition is a method to keep the history of printmaking a living venue of artistic expression. Each iteration, of which this is the 11th, is different in a guiding theme, selection of juror and place in time. Work is done within the last two years of entry to allow the subsequent exhibition to feature the fresh, innovative and creative practices of contemporary printmaking artists. For this competition solely digital or photographic prints are not eligible.

What Makes this event different?

The juror, Erin Sullivan Maynes, is Hoehn Curatorial Fellow for Prints at the University of San Diego, California. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Southern California in 2014. She is a specialist in the graphic arts, with a focus on prints and print culture of the 19th and 20th century, especially in Germany. Her dissertation, Speculating on Paper: Print Culture and the German Inflation, 1918-1924, considered the boom in graphic production that occurred during the most intense period of inflation in early Weimar-era Germany. The Jurors thoughts: “Contemporary printmaking is less transparent in terms of process—you cannot just look at a print any more to know how it is made. This challenges us to again redefine what print is at this moment and what it can be in the future. I would consider the connections between currency and print that resonate in a contemporary context as follows: the most literal is shared materials, paper and ink, and shared character as a multiple that nevertheless has limits put on its reproduction (an edition for the print, what a government is willing to print to keep prices stable in the case of money). Regarding material and edition, an alchemical transformation of material happens with both fine art and money— both take on a value far exceeding the value of their materials by virtue of a conceptual transformation rather than a material one. This conceptual link to value is necessary for both paper money and for the print to retain value and status, to be considered something more than pictures printed on paper."

Copyright Policy

The artist retains copyright. Permission is asked for limited reproduction for publicity and catalogs.

Image Usage Rights

Printmakers retain copyright unless specifically granted to the Janet Turner Print Museum. Images will be used for publicity and for the production of an exhibition catalog.

As a specific fine art print museum, the Janet Turner Print Museum has been sited at California State University, Chico since 1981.  It is a collecting museum and its nearly 4,000 prints span six centuries and 40 countries with a broad represenation of printmaking techniques.  Its program celebrates printmaking with six exhibitions in its main gallery and six smaller exhibitions in the Ayres Hall cases annex.  In addition the collection is used educationally for student study across disciplines, for individual study and as a visual outreach destination.

The print competition and exhibition biennially brings to our community the freshness and inovation of contemporary prints, gives artists a chance to exhibit their current focus, refreshes the Turner Collection with a new point of view and generally demonstrates the role of printmakers in the art world today.  The biennal recognizes the changes in printmaking techniques and the addition of other formats such as time based or installative works, however solely digital or photographic prints are not eligible.

Catherine Sullivan, curator & head of collection

Janet Turner Print Museum

CSU. Chico

400 W. 1st Street

Chico CA  95929-0820       530-898-4476

 csullivan@csuchico.edu

www.theturner.org

www.facebook.com/The TurnerPrint Museum