Stories We Tell
20 x 16 in (h x w)

One of the universal and most powerful tools of worldmaking is storytelling. The impulse to make sense of the world with origin stories and histories, and to describe the vast range of human beliefs and experiences, whether mundane or supernatural, seems an innate urge. This grouping features printmakers who compose stories by visual means from different epochs, geographies, and traditions. They explore narratives condensed into a single poignant moment, redirected into allegorical or mythical form, or extended across a series. Typically, stories contain moral or ethical exempla, serving as warnings of the pleasures or dangers of navigating the world. Artists illustrate epic tales of heroism and villainy, virtue and vice, gods and monsters, wise prophets and fervent lovers, prudent and foolish rulers. These figures occupy worlds from times gone by, in anticipated futures, and in alternative timeless realms conjured by our imagination, desires, fears. Whether published in books, performed in theaters, shared around campfires, passed orally through generations—or perhaps imaged and disseminated in prints—stories have the capacity to evolve across contexts and with new technologies to serve as open-ended repositories of cultural memory.

Exhibited by:

The Berman Museum of Art

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