No pressure. No diamonds.
The five decades of Jack Lemon’s life’s work was not just producing and publishing the prints, multiples, portfolios, books, posters, magazines, catalogs, and 33rpm and 45rpm vinyl records, it’s also the relationships he’s initiated and maintained over those 50 years. Landfall Press has maintained a reputation all along for ground-breaking diversity, inclusion and forward thinking artists; many who made their first prints with Jack Lemon have continued to do so through Landfall’s five decades of operation.
Landfall Press was founded in 1970 at 63 West Ontario Street in Chicago. The workshop was relocated five times over five decades, each time the scale of the workshop expanded and grew.
1970s
Landfall’s first workshop at 63 West Ontario was a nine hundred square foot space located on the first floor. It held three presses, graining area, artist’s room and ink mixing station. Lemon and his team printed lithographs by hand nearly round the clock, producing not only Landfall editions but also contract work for other publishers (Parasol Press, Petersburg Press and Multiples, Inc). Some of the first Landfall publications were portfolios of lithographs by Christo, Philip Pearlstein and Sol LeWitt. In 1974, Landfall added an etching studio on the third floor of the walkup building. This significantly expanded the printmaking processes available to artists. The experimental spirit of Landfall in the 70’s also led Jack Lemon to create FATE Records in order to publish Terry Allen’s Juarez Suite, comprised of prints and a limited edition vinyl LP. To combine performance and prints in one project made this a ground breaking publication for both Landfall and the artist.
By the end of the decade, Landfall Press had printed more than two hundred editions and established itself in the international art world.
Jack Lemon and Christo at 63 West Ontario Street, Chicago. They are proofing Christo’s “Whitney Museum, Packed” lithograph included in the portfolio “Some Not, Realized Projects” 1971
1980s
In 1979, Landfall Press relocated to the newly established gallery district in Chicago’s River North neighborhood. The print shop was now double the size of the first, and included a gallery space which allowed Landfall to display its editions and projects to the public.
The global print market was booming in the 80’s. Landfall Press sought to further expand it’s international reach and influence. In 1980, Jack Lemon was a founding organizer of the inaugural year of Art Chicago, one of the world first international art fairs to be held in North America. Art Chicago became the premier art fair in the United States and is known today as EXPO Chicago. In 1984, Landfall Press opened another gallery space right in the center of the art market at that time, the destination for contemporary art and artists - New York City’s Soho district.
In the 80’s, a new generation of artists emerged in this growing market for art and prints. Many of these artists made their first groundbreaking editions at Landfall Press, while artists who had produced publications at the workshop in the 1970’s often returned to Landfall to create additional projects, frequently pushing the technical possibilities of print and their own work as a result of the Landfall collaboration.
Jack Lemon and Barb Spies Labus proof a lithograph by Jack Cowin at 215 West Superior Street, the workshop’s second location in Chicago, 1983.
1990s
In 1989, a devastating fire in the River North gallery district, home to Landfall Press since 1979, changed the landscape of the Chicago art scene and instigated another relocation for Landfall. Jack Lemon chose to stay in the city, moving the workshop and gallery south of the Chicago Loop to 329 West 18th Street. This new, still larger space was where Landfall’s senior printer, Steve Campbell, joined the company, in 1989.
A recession that began in the late 1980’s continued to affect the economy, and the art world, well into the 1990’s. Landfall Press halted all contract printing and focused exclusively on publishing projects. It closed it’s exhibition space in New York but continued to show its prints at Quartet Editions in Soho until 2002.
Although the print market had changed, Landfall Press began to receive institutional recognition in the 1990’s. In 1992, the Milwaukee Art Museum acquired the Landfall Press Archive, which consists of impressions of Landfall publications along with the objects and materials that went into making the completed prints. In 1996, the Milwaukee Art Museum organized a celebratory exhibition and produced a catalogue in honor of Landfall’s twenty-fifth anniversary. The Art Institute of Chicago presented its own celebration of the milestone in 1995, and in 1997, the Museum of Modern Art in New York opened the exhibition; A Singular Vision: Prints from Landfall Press. Together, the three exhibitions and the Milwaukee Art Museum’s catalogue and archive solidified Landfall’s reputation. Landfall was well positioned for the millenium that lay ahead.
Landfall Press Senior Printer Steve Campbell and artist Kara Walker proofing her first large scale etching project “The Means to an end…A Shadow Drama in Five Acts” at Landfall’s third location at 329 West 18th Street in Chicago, 1995.
2000s
Santa Fe - From the late 1990’s through the early 2000’s, Landfall continued to publish lithographs, etchings and woodcuts, along with books and multiples. Jack Lemon was committed to bringing Landfall Press into the new millennium with new talent, while honoring established relationships with artists and mentors from his past. Landfall’s 30th Anniversary Portfolio provided a summation of significant relationships with artists, featuring Terry Allen, Christo, Robert Cottingham, Jim Dine, Vernon Fisher, Sol LeWitt, Claes Oldenburg, Ed Paschke, Philip Pearlstein, Jeanette Pasin-Sloan, Pat Steir, H.C. Westermann and William T. Wiley. In 2001, Landfall printed and published editions with Garo Z. Antresian, who had become a mentor to Jack Lemon through the Printer Fellow programs at the University of New Mexico in 1965 and the Tamarind Lithography Workshop in Los Angeles in 1966.
Landfall Press remained in it’s third and final space in Chicago until 2004, when Lemon moved the workshop, gallery and staff to 1589 San Mateo Lane, Santa Fe, New Mexico.
For the second location in Santa Fe, Jack Lemon acquired a vintage, belt-driven Marinoni-Voirin lithography press. The press was installed in the largest and final workshop Landfall was to occupy at 1143 Siler Park Lane in Santa Fe. The French press that had printed works during the explosion of color lithography in Paris in the late 1800’s now offered new options to the next generation of young, international artists seeking to create prints. The French Press and the expanded workshop brought new life to Landfall’s twenty-first-century practices and the collaborations they chose with artists and institutions.
By 2019, Landfall Press had printed and/or published more than 3,400 separate editions/projects over the five decades. The book documents these extraordinary achievements and explores the dynamics and practices of Landfall Press and Jack Lemon as printer, publisher, owner, founder, visionary.
Landfall’s fourth location at 1589 San Mateo Lane in Santa Fe, New Mexico
This vintage Marinoni-Voirin direct lithography press built/used in Paris during the 1800’s is printing editions at 1143 Siler Park Lane, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Landfall Press’s final location, 2019.
The exhibition Landfall Press: Five Decades of Printmaking was curated by Jack Lemon, Thomas Cvikota and Nikki Otten (Curator of Prints and Drawings at the Milwaukee Art Museum). This exhibition highlighted editions printed and published at Landfall Press, Inc. from 1970-2019. This exhibition will travel to other venues through 2024. Inquiries about the exhibition and book may be made using the contact section of this website.
Photography credits: David Keister, Landfall Press, Thomas Cvikota, Peter Ellzey
Landfall Press: Five Decades of Printmaking
OCTOBER 23, 2019 - FEBRUARY 9, 2020 AT THE MILWAUKEE ART MUSEUM
The traveling exhibition - Landfall Press: Five Decades is currently accepting applications from institutions interested in hosting the exhibition. Please contact Jack Lemon at info@landfallpress.com