John Nixon
Self Portrait (Non-Objective Composition) (Purple) (Red) (Brown) (Black) (Ultramarine Blue)

1988

EB57

5 woodblock prints from plywood
each 100 x 70 cm

Edition of 40 + 12 AP, signed and numbered

available with the portfolio "AUS AUSTRALIEN"

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part of portfolio AUS AUSTRALIEN
Woodblock prints by John Nixon. Monochrome print in blue. Printed with plywood block without further intervention by the artist, so that the untouched wood grain is visible on the paper.
Woodblock prints by John Nixon. Monochrome print in black. Printed with plywood block without further intervention by the artist, so that the untouched wood grain is visible on the paper.
Woodblock prints by John Nixon. Monochrome print in brown. Printed with plywood block without further intervention by the artist, so that the untouched wood grain is visible on the paper.
Woodblock prints by John Nixon. Monochrome print in red. Printed with plywood block without further intervention by the artist, so that the untouched wood grain is visible on the paper.
Woodblock prints by John Nixon. Monochrome print in ultramarine blue. Printed with plywood block without further intervention by the artist, so that the untouched wood grain is visible on the paper.

    The five woodcuts created by conceptual artist John Nixon for the graphic portfolio Aus Australien (EB57) are among his earliest attempts at printmaking. These are monochrome prints in the colors mentioned in the title: violet, red, brown, black, and ultramarine blue. They were printed from plywood blocks of various sizes without Nixon intervening further, in contrast to traditional woodcuts, so that the untouched wood grain shows through on the paper.
    Constructivism, monochromy, and the readymade are reference points in Nixon’s work, which revolves around the political and social programs of early modernism and the relevance of its utopian aesthetics.
    “The monochrome and the readymade are two vehicles with which the artist can analyze contemporary art in the twentieth century. These are the two vehicles that I have chosen to work with, because they represent, let’s say, the most basic forms of practice—the practice as choice (or nomination), not practice as skill. So already you’re working within the intellectual terrain, not in terms of technique.”1
    Text: Katrin Seemann

    1 John Nixon, in: „Interview. John Nixon with Ben Curnow“, in: John Nixon, Thesis. Selected Works From 1968–1993, ACCA Melbourne 1994, n.p.