SANTA FE, NM.- Zane Bennett Contemporary Art is pleased to present Print Focus: Gemini G.E.L., the second iteration of the gallery exhibition series highlighting publishers with groundbreaking programs for fine art printmaking. Co-founded by Sidney Felsen, Stanley Grinstein, and master printer Kenneth Tyler in 1966, Gemini G.E.L. is an artist's workshop and publisher of limited-edition prints and sculptures. It is known as the workshop where artists are never told "no"—a fitting mantra for an exhibition hosted at Zane Bennett, a gallery with a legacy of boundary-pushing exhibitions. Print Focus: Gemini G.E.L., featuring work by John Baldessari, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Susan Rothenberg, and Richard Serra, celebrates the workshop's "pursuit of creative exploration" and inspects the relationship between collaboration and experimentation. The exhibition opens in Zane Bennett's upstairs galleries on October 30, 5–7 p.m.
Robert Rauschenberg, American Pewter with Burroughs IV, 1981. Lithograph and embossment, 31 1/2 x 23 1/2 in (80 x 59.7 cm) © 1981 Robert Rauschenberg and Gemini G.E.L.
The spirit of experimentation at Gemini G.E.L. is evident in the editions it produces. In Baldessari's Noses & Ears, Etc.: Face with Nose and (Green) Ear, Gemini's printers liberated Baldessari's art historical exploration of the portrait from the two-dimensional plane by carving forms from Sintra board, adhering screenprints to them, and assembling them into their final composition—an experimental and risk-taking approach with affinities to gallerist Sandy Zane's business approach. "I have been jumping off cliffs all of my life," says Zane. "So far, I haven't hit the ground." For the last twenty-one years, Zane Bennett, like Gemini's printmaking, has added new dimensions to the gallery business model, operating at times as a cooperative, community space, and above all, a platform for experimental exhibitions.
Experimentation has been a historically key facet of New Mexico's arts ecosystem since at least the 1910s, when post-World War I American modernists flocked to the newly minted state for its light, landscape, and culture. Today, the creative spirit of New Mexico is encapsulated in the legacies of female artists such as Agnes Martin, but history also points to a host of women patrons responsible for sustaining the region's vanguard talents, notably Mabel Dodge Luhan, who hosted and supported artists such as Georgia O'Keeffe, Alfred Stieglitz, and Andrew Dasburg. In 2003, Susan Rothenberg—who moved to New Mexico in 1990 for its artistic mystique—approached Gemini G.E.L. to cast seventeen heads sculpted from clay sourced from her ranch outside Santa Fe, NM, where she lived with her husband Bruce Nauman. The sculpture series, exhibited in full in Print Focus: Gemini G.E.L., would become 17 Heads and speaks to an enduring experimental spirit triangulated by Gemini G.E.L., New Mexico, and women artists.
Susan Rothenberg, Crying, 2003. Lithograph and screenprint, 34 x 35 in (86.4 x 88.9 cm) © 2003 Susan Rothenberg and Gemini G.E.L. LLC
If the spirit of the exhibition is experimentation, then the pretense for celebrating it is the perennial nature of the institutions that undergird it. Gemini writes:
In 2026, Gemini G.E.L. celebrates sixty years of extraordinary artistic collaboration and technical innovation. Since its founding in Los Angeles, Gemini has redefined the landscape of printmaking, transforming the concept of editioned works through its unique synthesis of artistic vision, master craftsmanship, and an enduring spirit of experimentation. As we mark this milestone, we celebrate not only six decades of groundbreaking work, but an ongoing pursuit of creative exploration.
Through global recessions, wars, and seasonal provincial attitudes, experimentation has sustained the arts. Impressions from editions by Robert Rauschenberg featured in the exhibition produced from 1969–1993, including Horn (Stoned Moon), American Pewter with Burroughs IV, and Rust Pursuit, stand as a testament not only to the artist's historically groundbreaking neo-dada practice but also to the importance of creative exploration in keeping art relevant—of responding to shifting cultural contexts and shared symbols, while remaining true to an overarching artistic ethos. Recall, if you will, Rauschenberg's Red Paintings (1953–54) when viewing Rust Pursuit (1992).
Susan Rothenberg, Uncorked (State), 2003. Uncorked (State), 2003. Lithograph and screenprint, 26 x 22 in (66 x 55.9 cm) © 2003 Susan Rothenberg and Gemini G.E.L. LLC
In experimentation, there is vulnerability. Businesses understand this implicitly and avoid it. And yet the art industry is nothing if not atypical. Print Focus: Gemini G.E.L. discards continuity for continuity's sake and instead embraces experimentation as a process to create a safe space for vulnerability, where art and the pursuit of its creation take priority over ego, financial gain, or social prestige. In this exhibition, gallerist Zane looks to the legacy of institutions such as Gemini G.E.L.; the art history of her beloved state, NM; and perhaps most of all, women artists, as the stewards of art's future.
Susan Rothenberg, 17 Heads #9, 2003. Cast solid sterling silver, 1 1/8 x 1 5/8 x 2 1/8 in (2.9 x 4.1 x 5.4 cm) © 2003 Susan Rothenberg and Gemini G.E.L.LLC
Gemini G.E.L.
Founded in 1966, Gemini G.E.L. is a Los Angeles–based publisher and artists' workshop for limited-edition fine art prints and sculptures, complemented by two on-site galleries—one of which was designed by Frank Gehry and completed in 1979—that showcase the works it produces. Located at 8365 Melrose Avenue in the city's arts and design district, Gemini has collaborated with the most influential artists of the late 20th and early 21st centuries, including John Baldessari, Vija Celmins, Tacita Dean, Philip Guston, Ann Hamilton, David Hockney, Jasper Johns, Ellsworth Kelly, Roy Lichtenstein, Julie Mehretu, Bruce Nauman, Isamu Noguchi, Claes Oldenburg, Robert Rauschenberg, Ed Ruscha, Analia Saban, Frank Stella and Richard Serra, among others. Gemini has produced some of the era's most celebrated editioned multiples through lithography, etching, screen-printing, woodcut, and various sculptural media. Collaboration is strictly by invitation, and many artists return over decades to embark on new projects, reflecting the longstanding relationships and innovative spirit that define Gemini. Now stewarded by the families of co-founders Sidney B. Felsen (1924–2024) and Stanley Grinstein (1930–2014), Gemini continues with the same ethos: to bring artists' visions to life through creativity, problem-solving, experimentation, and innovation. In 2026, Gemini will celebrate its 60th anniversary, affirming its place as one of the longest-standing and most influential artists' publishers and galleries.
