CHAKAIA BOOKER

Since 2009 Chakaia Booker has created over 100 unique prints at the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop in collaboration with master printmakers Phil Sanders (2009-2014) and Justin Sanz (2015-2023). Though materially different than the sculptures made of rubber tires for which she’s known, Booker’s prints retain a visual link to her three-dimensional works. In her sculptural practice Booker often transforms the bulky tire into seemingly feather-light forms, imbuing the ubiquitous material with social and political implications. In her prints, Booker transforms the static nature of two-dimensional works into dense, patterned compositions almost buzzing with frenetic energy. In some, the gestural, abstract forms seem to burst forth from the geometric figures that are layered and stacked on the paper. In others, genderless figures composed of densely made patterns, float weightless in space yet ready to spring forth from the page. 

During her time at the Blackburn Printmaking Workshop, Booker experimented with production processes, devising new ways to create work and make marks that draw from the visual language of her sculptural works. In the same way Booker forms sculptures out of unexpected materials, her prints are made with an innovative printing technique. Booker utilizes thin, delicate papers that become transparent during the printing process, allowing each layer to bleed into the next. She then tears and cuts these papers, combining them to make the final forms—an incredibly meticulous process. In the results of this incredible technique, Booker proves she can bend any medium to her will. 

- Hallie Ringle, Hugh Kaul Curator for Contemporary Art, The Birmingham Museum of Art

ARTISTS BOOKS

EDITIONS

Untitled 2016

Lithography and chine collé

29 × 20 in

Edition of 25

UNIQUE WORKS on PAPER

Further Reading

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Chakaia Booker received a B.A. in Sociology from Rutgers University (1976) and a MFA from the City College of New York (1993). She was selected for the Whitney Biennial in 2000, awarded the Pollock-Krasner Grant in 2002 and received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2005. Booker's work has been exhibited widely both nationally and internationally. Select solo exhibitions include: The National Museum of Women in the Arts; Milwaukee Art Museum; The Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art; Queens Museum of Art; Katonah Museum of Art and Storm King Arts Center. She has been included in group exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Museum of Art and Design, Bronx Museum of the Arts, The Studio Museum in Harlem and the Corcoran Gallery of Art, among others. Her work is the collections of the following selected institutions: the Bronx Museum of Art; The Metropolitan Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, New Orleans Museum of Art; Newark Museum and The Snite Museum of Art. Booker lives in New York City and her studio is located in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

To inquire, email: rbpmw@efanyc.org

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