Bill Goldston

2023 Hall of Fame

BFA Art '66

Although Bill Goldston was born in Hatch, New Mexico, and grew up on a farm in southern Oklahoma, he has spent most of his life in New York, working for world-renowned fine-art printing company Universal Limited Art Editions (ULAE) as a master printer and mentor to young artists.

After graduating from Lindsay High School in 1961, Goldston attended Oklahoma State University and received his Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1966.

“I learned from OSU professors McKinney, Benson, Bloodgood and McVicker that there is no substitute for hard work in the studio,” Goldston said.

He continued his art education by attending the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. In September 1967, Goldston was drafted into the U.S. Army and completed two years serving as a commercial printer before returning to school in 1969.

At that time, Zigmunds Priede, Goldston’s printmaking instructor and a former printer at ULAE, asked if he would accompany him to work for ULAE founder Tatyana Grosman at her home studio of Skidmore Place. The summer of 1969 was principally spent printing the photo-sensitive stone series with Robert Rauschenberg. Goldston continued to fly back and forth between New York and Minnesota until he finished his Master of Fine Arts degree and moved to Long Island to begin his full-time career at ULAE in 1971.

Since Grosman’s death in 1982, the legendary print studio has continued to be a unique center for the production of artists’ prints. The successes of the past 40 years are owed largely to Goldston’s guidance. By the 1980s, Goldston had purchased different and larger presses and established four additional off-site ULAE workshops.

During this time, Goldston began a student intern program with OSU’s art department to bring students to New York to work with world-class artists at ULAE and attend museum and gallery exhibitions. As of today, more than 100 OSU students have lived at Skidmore Place and benefited from the internship program.

“When I was an art student at OSU in the early- to mid-sixties, to understand what was happening in the New York or Los Angles art scenes, I looked to magazines like Look, Life, Saturday Evening Post and Art News,” Goldston said. “So, when I graduated, I made myself a promise that if I was successful in my postgraduate years, I would find a way to help OSU art students experience art firsthand.”

In guiding ULAE’s expansion, Goldston has maintained the sense of community and spirit always associated with the house on Skidmore Place. The vision and determination of Goldston, his daughter, Larissa, and the veteran artists and printers have sustained Grosman’s memory through their work and their own dedication to quality, creativity and the necessity of experimentation.