R
obert Arber, master printer and founder of Arber & Sons Editions in
Marfa, Texas, first visited the small West Texas town in 1988 because of
Donald Judd. He was intrigued by the Minimalist artist who had
relocated to Marfa from New York in 1973, and one of Judd’s largest
projects, e Chinati Foundation, had recently opened to the public in 1986. After
visiting the property, Arber decided to approach Judd and the Foundation’s board
about opening an on-site print shop. He proposed a collaboration with both Judd,
who had made prints throughout his career, and any visiting artists or artist in
residence. e proposal was accepted, and Arber began to set up his print shop.
At the time, Arber was living in New Mexico, where he had attended the Tamarind
Institute, the only printmaking school in the world that specifically teaches fine art
lithography. A lithograph, compared to an engraving or etching, is planographic (the
design is all on the same surface) rather than the surface having incised lines. A
lithograph design is made on a large slab of limestone. is limestone comes from a
quarry in Southern Germany and is the purest limestone that has been found in the
world. e stone is free of fossils and other organic matter that would cause
irregularities in the print.
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Tamarind Institute was founded in 1960 in Los Angeles as a means to save the
dying art of lithography, and in 1970 it became affiliated with the University of New
Mexico in Albuquerque. A highly intensive program, Tamarind only accepts four
students a year. Arber was accepted in 1970 and after two rigorous years as an
apprentice, he graduated as a master printmaker, a title he chooses to not use. “I
never use the word master printer, because I don’t feel like I’m a master. If you’re a
master, you don’t screw up. I screw up often, but I do think a master knows how to
solve a screw up.”
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It was during his education that Arber decided he did not want to be an imagemaker
but a collaborator and facilitator of an artist’s ideas. With lithographs, the printmaker
and artist have to work closely together, and Arber said this is the aspect he enjoys
the most, “It’s the artist’s project, but the master printer is a key facilitator of the
whole project and vision.” Typically, the printer’s involvement is acknowledged by
their “chop,” an embossed symbol in the corner of a print that the printer has
designed. Arber, whose last name means tree, designed a stylized tree as his chop; it
emphasizes both the root system below ground and the trunk and branches above
ground.
Arber founded his first print shop in 1976 in the small town of Alameda, New
Mexico, ten miles north of Albuquerque. His son, Amos Oak Arber, had just been born,
so he decided to name his shop Arber & Sons Editions. For the next thirty-five years,
Arber and his wife Valerie, an artist, lived in New Mexico.
When Arber set up his second print shop at Chinati, he traveled back and forth
between New Mexico and Marfa, primarily working with Judd on a huge woodcut
project called “e Korean Project,” which was never completed due to Judd’s death
in 1994.
In 1998, after selling their property in Alameda, Arber decided to relocate his New
Mexico print shop to Marfa. He purchased an old movie theater on El Paso Street in
Marfa where he and Valerie eventually moved permanently. e print shop and a
gallery space are located on the lower level, and their apartment space is in the former
projection booth. Today, Arber continues to make and sell artist’s prints and Valerie’s
work from the shop.
Beginning in 2003, he began working with the Chinati artist in residence on a
project Arber created called the 30 x 30 cm Project. Here again, for Arber the relational
aspect of collaboration is the most appealing part of his work, “A lot of collaboration
takes place in the bar where you learn about that person, what their goals are… It’s
about the relationship with the artist, like with Judd. I hung out and drank with him,
got to know him, and we almost never talked about art, but politics and the
environment mainly.” Learn more at www.30x30cmproject.com.
– by Katherine Stephens
at the Hotel
Paisano
207 North Highland
Marfa, Texas 79843
432-729-4134
www.HotelPaisano.com
BIG BEND GALLERIES AND ARTISTS / 2019 19