Art of the Series: Printmaking, Painting, & PFPs
While we generally want art to be âoriginal,â the series â whether itâs in printmaking, painting, or PFPsâ offers us a different image of art where there is no original, only a network of versions. The relationship between the different versions form a kind of conspiracy as, together, they make up whatever âitâ is. The âoriginalâ lives between, and as, each piece.
The Logic of the Series is the Network
In general, we think about works of art as original, each piece one-of-one, an absolutely rare object created by an equally rare eventâthe artistâs inspiration. But there are works that are not one-of-one but, rather, one-of-one-of-x: the series, which enjoys a different logic, one that doesnât rely on an original.
A series, whether itâs prints, paintings, or PFPs, operates with the logic of the network. There is no point of origin, no master mode, no hierarchy. What we get is versions upon versions, all interwoven, a cloud of images creating a kind of conspiracy. Together, they make up whatever âitâ is. The original, if we can say there is one, lives between, among, and as each piece.
Perhaps ironically, by eliminating an original, the series fosters creativity. Rather than there being one singular thing, the series allows every element to be singular while connected to a larger network.
Printmaking: Warholâs Marilyns
When we think of art series, we most likely think first and foremost of printmaking. Indeed, in its very structure, printmaking challenges the notion of the original. Working from plates, woodblocks, silkscreens, or any number of other technologies, including Xerox machinesâthereâs even an International Society of Copier Artistsâprintmakers can produce an infinite number of pieces. In which case, what could count as the original image? Perhaps the plate but, well, thatâs an odd original in that itâs not really legible. So rather than think about the plate as the original, we can think of the plate as code that generates the images.
Of course, as scarcity drives value, by producing an infinite number of prints, an artist renders each print near-worthless. Which is why fine art printmakers generally create limited, numbered series â 1-of-x â after which they destroy the plate, ensuring there will be no new pieces in that series. (This is one place the blockchain comes in handy, authenticating each work while proving no new ones have been created.)
Take Warholâs Marilyn series of 10 silkscreens. Which is the âoriginalâ? You might say itâs the found image he was working from â which isnât even in the series, isnât even considered âartâ but rather is found cultural detritus. Presenting Marilyn in different hues and shades, Warhol takes her from the claws of mass media to give us something elseâthe star-as-image, inherently plastic, malleable, a series of possibilities, of moods. Once sheâs been taken up by the media and turned into an image, Warhol tells us, is there still just one original Marilyn?
Painting: Monetâs Haystacks & Richterâs Cage Paintings
While printmaking seems inherently to produce series, we tend to think of paintings as singular, each an original work of art. But painters have series, too. Monet, for example, painted a series of series â from water lilies to haystacks.
For Monet, haystacks are not one thing you can point to or hold in your hands. Rather, haystacks are a sensibility, a mood that doesnât reside in any one stack but lives in, and between, them all. After all, things exist in time. They change. And so Monet paints them in their different forms, in different light, in different seasons.
In a sense, Monetâs series of haystacks is like a Cubist painting where each painting is another side, another perspective, of haystacks. We know the original haystack by seeing the series of haystacks.
Or take Gerhard Richterâs Cage Paintings, a series of six canvases he painted while listening to the music of John Cage. In this case, we donât get different perspectives on a thing. Instead, we get iterations of a mood, of ways John Cage can inflect life â in this case, how it inflect Richterâs painting process. In doing so, Richter even displaces himself as original. Rather than playing âmasterâ conjuring worlds, he explicitly positions himself as conduit between Cage, painting, and canvas. And as heâs a living conduit, and Cageâs music is different at different times, the series allows for fluctuations, for difference to emerge.
PFPs: CryptoPunks and Milady Maker
In recent years, weâve seen the rise of the PFP, profile pictures often sold as NFTs which are authenticated on the blockchain. As the name suggests, they are indeed profile pictures people use for their social media accounts. Most often created through generative algorithms, each PFP is unique while being part of a collection.
An early, and perhaps the most well known, collection is Larva Labsâ CryptoPunks â 10,000 unique pixelated characters. Each is singular yet some have rarer traits, or a rarer number of traits, than others. For instance, while there are five different types â male, female, zombie, ape, and alien â there are 6,039 male punks but only nine alien. Each type then enjoys some set of traits such as glasses, pipes, hoods, shades, beards, and so on.
PFPs might in fact be the clearest example of a series without original. After all, what would, what could, be the original? The algorithm, perhaps. Akin to the printmakerâs plate, though, the code isnât really legible. And, as with printmakers, PFP creators destroy their code after production.
But what makes PFPs particularly intriguing is that they donât just efface an original image, they efface the ownerâs âoriginalâ identity. While Richter, in his Cage series, displaces himself as master, PFPs displace the artist and the owner as original.
As CryptoPunks appear across the internet, they form a network as the collection of one-of-one artworks become a collection of one-of-one people. Which, in turn, has created a community â not in the generic sense of that word but actual community: people interacting with each other, online and IRL.
And hereâs the thing: itâs not just a community but itâs this community. The CryptoPunks community is certainly not the same as the Milady Maker community. Which is to say, the series is not just a neutral series but it creates a space, a mood, a sensibility of that community, a way of interacting that is particular to it. In a sense, a series is a differential equation on calculus: a particular, and infinite, trajectory.
Which is precisely what community is: itâs a series! While politicians tend to think of âcommunityâ as uniform, communities are decidedly not homogeneous. And not all communities are the same. PFPs communities show us that communities are series of distinct, unique voices that operate within the terms of that series: a particular collection of one-of-one-of-x.
The Beauty of a Post-Original World
While we tend to think of art as the creation of originals, the logic of the series â whether itâs in printmaking, generative art, or painting â gives us a different vision of art: not a one-of-one but a network â collections of difference.
The logic of the original has a way of shutting down creativity. The logic of the series, on the other hand, is generous, fostering difference and togetherness. One might say itâs the anarchist dream, allowing for all these different versions that are interlinked, working together not to unify but to distribute this or that sensibility. It encourages individuals to be individuals while connecting them to each other.
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