Impression expression

Arts & Activities, Nov, 2004 by Tara Cady Sartorius

If the crust of the earth became as thin and transparent as a sheet of clear acetate, and "the big one" happened in California, it might just be possible that the cities of San Francisco and Los Angeles would overlap. Above, artist Ed Ruscha presents what could be construed as a form of street map after the cataclysm.

Some of the most famous streets from each city (San Francisco's Powell and Hyde, and Los Angeles' Wilshire and Beverly) appear merged in one small section of an imaginary streetscape. San Francisco in the north and Los Angeles in the south are cities with very different characters, yet here it seems that parts of them are combined into one hybrid metropolis.

Los Francisco, San Angeles is the title of Ruscha's 2001 series of seven soft-ground color etchings that were created in an edition of 45. All seven impressions in the series combine streets from both cities, but this one, Wilshire, Grant, is probably the most complex because it comprises some of the simpler plates from other prints in the series in combination with each other. This suite of minimal images presents the world as both orderly and terribly mixed up.

It's art for those in the know. People from California, especially people familiar with the two largest cities in the state, might view Wilshire, Grant as the merging of two civic hearts, a marriage of intersections, a love poem to the core of California urban dwelling.

Others, who might favor one city over the other, could see the presence of the "rogue" streets of the rival city as invasive and jarring. Either way, Ruscha takes words and lines (that appear to represent a diagram of streets) loaded with meaning and familiarity for millions of people, and merges them into one image.

Here, Ruscha does what he is best known for: taking words and letters out of context and presenting them as objects in themselves. The viewer is often left holding the "bag" of meaning, left to interpret the image for him or herself in whatever way he or she wants.

The truth is, Wilshire, Grant is not a map of anything. It is a bunch of words and letters and lines that conjure "map" in the mind. Any interpretation more complicated than that might be the invention of the viewer. The artist simply points the viewer in a certain direction, gives a little nudge and then quietly takes his leave.

The print can be taken at two levels: as pure abstraction through a simple arrangement of lines and words or as a combination of the familiar into a thought provoking, loaded picture. This is the gift of Ed Ruscha. His work often challenges the viewer to detach from the familiar and to consider viewing it impersonally. He is conscious that his subjects are well-known to his audience, as in this case where he refers to street maps of "their" cities.

Presented as a view from above, the image imposes objectivity on the part of the viewer. Even the block lettering of the street names is impersonal and matter-of-fact, as an authoritative street map should be.

After the first glance, however, it turns out the street directions do not run in the "real" directions of the "real" streets. Furthermore, the multiple parallel lines of the streets give the blurry impression of a time-lapse photograph of headlights and taillights produced by moving traffic.

All the prints in this portfolio are soft-ground etchings, which is a different process from making regular (or hard-line) etchings. In a soft-ground etching, the metal plate (originally, in the 18th century and in this case, copper) is covered with a ground with tallow or grease added into it. A thin piece of paper is placed over the whole plate, and a drawing is made with pencil on the paper. The pressure of the pencil causes the paper to stick to the soft ground beneath. When the paper is removed, it also removes a line of sticky ground on the back of the paper. The exposed metal line, which becomes an etched line on the plate, is softer or blurrier than with a hard-ground etching. Soft- ground prints often look more graphic as if done with a crayon or charcoal and are sometimes mistaken for lithographs.

Next, the plate is then placed in a shallow pan of acid to "bite" or etch the exposed metal. After cleaning the plate, colored ink is rubbed into the grooves and then carefully wiped off the flat surface of the plate. A piece of damp paper is centered over the plate. The plate and paper are sandwiched between thick felt blankets and then rolled at high pressure through a printing press.

Ed Ruscha was born in Omaha, Nebraska, and raised in Oklahoma. He moved to Los Angeles at age 19 to study commercial art at the Chouinard Art Institute, now the California Institute of the Arts. He caught the California "bug" and has lived, besides various travels abroad, in the Los Angeles area ever since. He has worked steadily throughout his successful career making artist books, films, paintings and prints.

Ruscha has often been associated with Pop Art; he greatly admired artists such as Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns when he was first exposed to fine art. Pop Art is probably the closest term art experts could hold onto if one must attach such a handle to the artist, but such labels often limit the perception of an artist's intentions.