CHARLOTTE, NC.- Bechtler Museum of Modern Art presents Making an Impression: Pioneering Latin American Printmakers, a major exhibition that brings together works by Rufino Tamayo (Mexican, 1899–1991), Jesús Rafael Soto (Venezuelan, 1923–2005), Regina Silveira (Brazilian, born 1939) and Analia Saban (Argentinian, born 1980). On view from September 26, 2026, through February 1, 2027, and curated by Bechtler Curator Dr. Katia Zavistovski, the exhibition examines how artists across generations have transformed the possibilities of printmaking through material and perceptual innovation.

Spanning works on paper, sculptural editions, vinyl installations, and technologically driven processes, Making an Impression highlights printmaking as a dynamic field of experimentation that continually redefines the relationship between image, surface and space. For each of these artists, printmaking serves not simply as a means of reproduction, but as a site of invention.

“Making an Impression reflects the Bechtler’s commitment to expanding how audiences encounter modern and contemporary art,” said Todd D. Smith, Executive Director of the Bechtler Museum of Modern Art. “By bringing together four artists who span more than a century of practice, the exhibition reveals printmaking as one of the most inventive and forward-looking mediums of our time—and underscores the central role Latin American artists have played in pushing its boundaries.”

Rufino Tamayo was one of the most celebrated Mexican artists of the twentieth century, known for developing a modernist visual language that merged international avant-garde styles with references to Indigenous and Mesoamerican art and culture. In the 1970s, he collaborated with the Mixografía printmaking workshop to pioneer a new process that introduced dimensional texture to the medium. The exhibition will feature 45 of his Mixografías, constituting one of the largest presentations of this body of work in the United States.





Jesús Rafael Soto was one of the most influential figures associated with kinetic art and geometric abstraction in postwar Latin America. Born in Venezuela and based in Paris from 1950 onward, Soto created works that investigated optical vibration, viewer participation, and the relationship between line, space, and motion. The exhibition will include a selection of his 2D prints and his 3D serigraphs on Plexiglas, which destabilize fixed perception through layered lines, transparency, and industrial materials.

Regina Silveira is one of Brazil’s most internationally recognized contemporary artists, known for works that challenge perception through distortion and spatial illusion. Since the 1970s, she has worked across printmaking, photography, installation and digital media. The exhibition will include examples of her prints on paper and aluminum, as well as a monumental, site-specific vinyl installation that activates the architecture of the gallery itself.

Analia Saban, born in Buenos Aires and based in Los Angeles, is known for a multidisciplinary practice that reimagines the material, technical and conceptual foundations of artmaking. Working across printmaking, painting, sculpture, weaving and digital technologies, she transforms traditional artistic processes through experimentation and innovation. The exhibition will feature her work spanning a wide variety of printmaking techniques, including examples produced in collaboration with Mixografía, El Nopal, Lapis Press, Gemini G.E.L., and ADLAR Studio.

“These four artists, working across more than half a century, demonstrate how printmaking has evolved far beyond the printed page,” said Dr. Zavistovski. “Tamayo merged printmaking with sculptural relief; Soto extended it into perceptual experience; Silveira pushed it into architectural space; and Saban brings it into new technological territory. Together, they reveal the medium as a continually shifting arena for experimentation—one capable of engaging perception, architecture, technology and the changing conditions of contemporary image-making.”

Each of the featured artists is represented in the collections of leading international institutions, including Museum of Modern Art, New York; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Tate, London; Centre Pompidou, Paris; and Reina Sofía, Madrid. Making an Impression continues the Bechtler’s commitment to presenting both well-known and underrepresented modern and contemporary artists and to placing modernism in a global, cross-generational context.