Works on paper is a broad collecting category that encompasses any work of art created on a paper support, including original drawings, watercolors, pastels, and mixed media works as well as prints produced through processes such as lithography, serigraph, etching, woodblock, and monotype. The category includes both unique works, pieces that exist as single objects made directly by the artist's hand, and editioned prints, works produced in limited quantities from a matrix that the artist created and approved.

Paper as a support for art has a history stretching back centuries, and the works produced on it range from intimate sketches and studies to large-scale prints intended for public exhibition. In the market for Southwest and Native American art, works on paper offer collectors an opportunity to acquire works by significant artists at a range of price points, as prints and works on paper are often more accessible than paintings while carrying the same creative authority.

The technical processes used to create prints are themselves an important part of the story. Serigraphs, produced by forcing ink through a silk screen, can achieve rich, saturated color effects particularly well suited to the bold palette of much Southwest art. Lithographs, drawn directly on stone or plate, carry the spontaneity of the artist's hand in a way that other print processes sometimes cannot. Etchings and woodblocks add texture and tonal complexity that give them a distinctive character on the wall. Each process demands its own set of skills and produces its own kind of beauty.

Printmaking has played an important role in the history of Southwest art, both as a means of making significant works available to a broader audience and as a creative medium in its own right. Many of the most celebrated artists in the Southwest tradition worked extensively in print media, producing serigraphs and lithographs that are now among the most collected works in the secondary market for this field.

The ledger drawing tradition, one of the most distinctive and historically significant art forms to emerge from Native American culture in the nineteenth century, is itself a form of works on paper, with drawings made on the lined pages of account books that became available to Plains Indian artists as their access to traditional materials diminished. That tradition continues today, with contemporary Native American artists working in ledger and other paper-based formats that connect present practice to a powerful historical legacy.

Watercolor has also been central to the Southwest art tradition, embraced by artists drawn to its ability to capture the particular luminosity of the desert light and the transparency of the vast Southwest sky. The watercolors produced by artists working in New Mexico and the broader region have a freshness and immediacy that oil paintings sometimes cannot match, and they are among the most beloved works in any collection of Southwest art.

The documentary and photographic works on paper in this collection, including historic photogravures produced through a meticulous printing process that gives them extraordinary richness and depth, represent another dimension of the category that is particularly significant in the Southwest context.

Collectors interested in the printmaking traditions of specific artists or movements will find natural connections throughout our broader collection. Our Old Masters collection includes many of the most significant prints produced by the defining figures of Southwest art, while our ledger art collection focuses specifically on one of the most historically resonant paper-based traditions in Native American art. And for collectors drawn to the documentary dimension of works on paper, our photographs collection offers a focused selection of photographic works with deep roots in the visual history of the Southwest.

Works on paper are among the most rewarding works to collect and to live with, offering a directness of creative expression and a range of scale and subject that makes them at home in almost any environment.