Albert Carman’s dates are 1899-1949. Very little can be found on this artist turned printer but examples of his work for other artists are in numerous museums. Thanks to Egon and Joan Teichert, we can offer the following biography:

Albert Carman was basically trained as a painter, but while teaching at the Florence Cane School in New York, he met Jean Charlot, and became interested in printing color lithography with the use of a Multilith press. The two men were committed to this new method of producing original lithographic prints, in several colors, at a low cost to the artist. A group practicing the process was formed at the Charles L. Morgan Galleries on 57th Street, New York City, called The Artists Color Proof Associates. It was to be a communal movement by artists, for artists, and would be a print studio organization. The printing of the lithographs would be done by Albert Carman. Some of the artists participating in the project were Jean Charlot, Howard Cook, Don Freeman, Russell Limbach, Louis Lozowick, George L.K. Morris, and David Park. Carman left teaching and focused on a career as a printer. His most important work was his collaboration with Marc Chagall on thirteen complex color lithographs for The Tales from the Arabian Nights, published in 1948.

In his book American Lithographs 1900-1960: The Artists and Their Printers, Clinton Adams wrote about the collaborative efforts of Jean Charlot and Albert Carman to create original prints using a Multilith press. Adams was very critical of the lithographs produced by The Artists Color Proof Associates but stated that Carman’s tour de force was his collaboration with Chagall. The rich collaboration of artist and printer as Carman had experienced with Chagall was never repeated. Adams further stated that “After 1945 he {Carman} spent much of his time in production of a series of magnificently printed, reproductive folios for the Metropolitan Museum of Art.” He footnoted that Carman maintained a press in a basement room at the Met.

Albert Carman died in the summer of 1949.