Ron Adams

Ron Adams (born June 25, 1934, in Detroit, Michigan – died 2020) was an American artist, master printmaker, and educator whose practice explored abstraction, visual language, portraiture, and the relationship between signs and meaning. Working across printmaking, painting, drawing, and mixed media, Adams examined image systems, form, and Black cultural presence through technically sophisticated lithographs, paintings, and works on paper.  Adams studied at Los Angeles Trade Technical College, UCLA, the University of Mexico, and Otis College of Art and Design, where he earned a certificate of trade proficiency in 1963. His work often engages abstraction, graphic language, and portrait form, using lithography, draftsmanship, and print-based experimentation to consider how visual symbols operate. He also trained at Gemini G.E.L. in Los Angeles and collaborated with major artists including Jasper Johns, Frank Stella, Roy Lichtenstein, John Biggers, and Judy Chicago.  His work is held by the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and he taught at several universities while maintaining an independent studio practice associated with Los Angeles and later Santa Fe. Ron Adams was active in both commercial and fine-art printmaking and is remembered as an important Black master printer.