Jerry's Map
May 30 — September 17, 2023
Jerry’s Map is comprised of over 4,000 individual eight by ten inch panels. Its execution—in acrylic, marker, colored pencil, ink, collage, and inkjet print on heavy paper—is dictated by the interplay between an elaborate set of rules and randomly generated instructions.
ABOUT THE MAP
Jerry Gretzinger began making the map of an imaginary city in the summer of 1963. The work started as a doodle that was done in his spare time while working a tedious job. He continued to add to that map throughout the years until he set it aside in 1983 to put his free time to other use.
The Map was stored in the attic of his home in Cold Spring, New York, and gathered dust. His son, Henry, found it one day while rummaging around, and brought it down to Jerry to ask what it was. Seeing it prompted Gretzinger to dust it off and continue the project. He continues to work on it to this day.
Learn more about The Map here: https://vimeo.com/6745866
ABOUT JERRY GRETZINGER
Jerry Gretzinger was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan in 1942. He studied architecture and liberal arts at the University of Michigan and the University of California. He joined the Peace Corps in 1966 and spent two years in Tunisia. He returned in 1968 as an architect with an archeological team cataloging the Roman mosaics there.
In 1973 Gretzinger returned to the United States and started a handbag design company in New York. His wife, Meg Staley, joined the company in the early 1980s in the design and manufacture of women’s clothing. Gretzinger retired to Maple City, Michigan in 2004.
Image: Jerry Gretzinger with Jerry's Map at Mass MOCA in 2012.
