Jack Whitten: The Greek Alphabet Series

On Whitten’s pioneering 1970s series marking his move away from gestural painting The first publication to delve deeply into Jack Whitten’s Greek Alphabet paintings (1975–78), this volume examines this remarkable series, which consists of variations on abstract, black-and-white compositions and experiments in mark-making. For these works, Whitten employed handmade tools and techniques including the comb, imprint and frottage. The series is illuminated through essays by art historian Courtney J. Martin and Dia curators Donna De Salvo and Matilde Guidelli-Guidi. Authors Fred Moten and Gregg Bordowitz provide poetic reflections on Whitten’s art, biography and cultural importance. Materials from Whitten’s archives, including his own personal writings, supplement this unprecedented publication. In his lifetime, Whitten never had the opportunity to exhibit more than a handful of these works. In publishing a significant number of these paintings together for the first time—with 40 color