I like that Jasper Johns looked at a blank lithography stone and decided the first image he would make with it was a zero. (I learned this fact on a recent staff tour of our current exhibition with Assistant Curator Renée Maurer.) It’s not difficult to imagine how a target came next–its basis is also a circle, also a symbol, but instead of quantifying nothingness, a target represents a very specific goal. Giotto famously demonstrated his artistic prowess by drawing a perfect circle without the aid of a compass. By beginning his printmaking career with the continuous, curved shape of infinity–first zeroed out, then honed in–Johns inscribed seemingly limitless potential.
Cecilia Wichmann, Publicity and Marketing Manager