Visiting Artist Lecture Series: Benjamin Levy

Calder, Miró, Kandinsky, Masson, Picasso, Nevelson, Bourgeois, Pollock. These are just a few of the names of the myriad artists associated with the Atelier 17, the collaborative print workshop founded by Stanley William Hayter in 1927 in Paris. Hayter would come to have an enormous effect on modern printmaking through not only his own work, but also through the workshop. The story of the Atelier 17 bridges the gap between pre- and post-WWII art, encompassing Surrealism and Modernism through Abstract Expressionism and beyond. The Atelier moved with the art world to New York from Paris, bringing with it an international and intergenerational group of artists. This melting pot of creative minds innovated and experimented both conceptually and technically with a profound emphasis on collaboration. Hayter was the nucleus around which artists investigated ideas, pedagogy, and technical innovations, and whose legacy paved the way for the post-war print boom.