Tag: etching

William Blake

William Blake, “God Judging Adam”, 1795, Copper Etching, 42.5 x 52.7 cm, Tate Museum

A nude and aged Adam, newly aware of his own nakedness and mortality, hangs his head before a fiery chariot bearing the divine maker whom he resembles exactly. For many years, this image was thought to represent Elijah in the fiery chariot. Recently, it has been connected to a passage in Genesis 3:17-19 in which God condemns Adam for tasting the forbidden fruit.

The print was made using a unique method of Blake’s invention. A plate etched in relief was used to print the design; then colors were painted onto millboard, or a similar surface, and printed onto the sheet like a monotype. Finally, Blake enhanced the print by hand with watercolor and ink.

Dario Wolf

Dario Wolf, “Gli Amici, (The Friends)”, 1924, Copper Etching, 16.7 x 13 cm, Private Collection

Dario Wolf was born in Trento, Italy on December 3, 1901. He completed high school in Rome with honors in the art of composition and painting of the nude. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts under the guidance of Sigismund Lipinskj. In 1924, still a student, Wolf won the Calderon prize for his entered drawing of a nude.

He started his career as an engraver in 1921 with the wood engraving “Furor Animae” and established himself as an etcher with the plates “Powerful-Powerless”, “Superstition” and “Destiny”. He was a member of the Group of Engravers and Roman Artists, composed of twenty-five Italian and foreign artists.

Dario Wolf devoted himself to the process of etching on metal and the technique of aquatint, producing “The Accordion Player”, on a large zinc plate in 1957. He was one of the very few who devoted themselves to engraving in steel technology, the “black style” as attested by his important 1963 engravings:: his “Ethiopian” in 1966,  and his “Vicolo dei Birri” in 1968.

“Etching is an art that can benefit more than any other to express moods fleeting, to realize the innermost thoughts and most complex, to express the life of things real and unreal atmosphere that goes from deep velvety shadows stretched to wrap lights enchanted ”- Dario Wolf

Eduard Wiiralt

Eduard Wiiralt, Title Unknown, Lithograph, 1926-34, Private Collection of Juhani Komulainen

Eduard Wiiralt was a well-known Estonian graphic artist, considered as a master of Estonian graphic arts in the first half of the 20th century. At the age of 17 Wiiralt entered Tallinn School of Applied Art where the Estonian painter and draughtsman Nikolai Triik exerted a srong influence on his work. Wiiralt continued his studies in Tartu at the art school Pallas in the sculpture studio of Anton Starkopf, learning the art of engraving.

Durig the period of 1922-23 his works contained a influence of the current German Expressionism. In 1924 he graduated form the Graphics Art Department of the Pallas school and led its graphic studio during the following year. He moved to Paris in 1925, remaining there without interruption until 1938. It was in Paris that he created his etching entitled “Hell”.

In 1937 the International Graphic Exhibition in Vienna recognized him as the leading engraver in Europe, honoring him with its Gold Medal. Wiiralt lived and worked in Marrrakesh, Morocco for six months starting in July of 1938, when he returned back to his homeland Estonia. At the end, he lived in Sceaux, a commune in Southern Paris until his death at the age of 55 in 1954. His complete work consists of some 450 engravings, etchings, wood engravings and lithographs in collections in Europe and America.

Joseph Mugnaini

Joseph Mugnaini, “Mr. Moundshroud”, 1971, Etcihing/ Aquatint, 40.6 x 31.1 cm, Collection of Ray Bradbury

This print was in Ray Bradbury’s personal collection. It is from a series of etchings done by Joseph Mugnaini for a collection of Ray Bradbury’s stories.

Joseph Anthony Mugnaini was born in Viareggio in the Tuscany region of Italy in 1912. He Immigrated with his family to the United States when he was three months old. He became an American citizen in 1941 and taught at the Pasadena School of Fine Arts, among others.

A talented lithographer, he is best known for his collaborations beginning in 1952 with writer Ray Badbury, who regarded him as both a friend and the best interpreter of his stories. As a result, he did the covers and interior art for several first editions of Bradbury’s works, as well as related projects like illustrations for a 1962 cartoon adaptation of Bradbury’s story “Icarus Montgolfier Wright”, originally printed in 1956.

For many, Mugnaini’s trademark style – an elongated human figure against a minimal or symbolic background – is indelibly linked with Bradbury’s fiction, explaining why his covers and interior art are still being used for recent editions of his works. Still, it should also be remembered that Mugnaini did provide evocative covers for a few books by other genre writers, including Robert Crane’s “Hero Walk”, Theodore Sturgeon’s “ A Touch of Strange”, and Louis Charbonneau’s “No Place on Earth”.

Francisco Goya

Francisco Goya, “Modo de Volar (Way to Fly)”, Plate 13 from the “Disparate” Series, The Third Grouping of Plates of the “Disasters of War”, 1816-1823

“The Disasters of War” was not published during Goya’s lifetime, possibly because he feared political repercussions from Fernando VII’s repressive regime. Some art historians suggest that he did not publish because he was sceptical about the use of images for political motives, and instead saw them as a personal meditation and release. Most, however, believe the artist preferred to wait until they could be made public without censorship. A further four editions were published, the last in 1937, so that in total over 1,000 impressions of each print have been printed, though not all of the same quality.

Goya worked on the “Disasters of War” during a period when he was producing images more for his own satisfaction than for any contemporary audience. His work came to rely less on historical incidents than his own imagination. Many of the later plates contain fantastical motifs which can be seen as a return to the imagery of the “Caprichos”, his prints on the universal follies of Spanish society. In this, he is relying on visual clues derived from his inner life, rather than anything that could be recognised from real events or settings. “Modo de Volar” is an example of that return to the “Caprichos” imagery.

Michael Goro

Michael Goro, “La Belle Fenetre”, Etching / Engraving, Date Unknown

“Looking for subject matter I find simple things that we see every day, things that become symbolic once they are taken out of context. I experiment with the juxtaposition of places, faces, and architectural designs that reflect my diverse personal experiences. My story is a vivid illustration of the end of the last century – a time of deconstruction, discontinuity, and dislocation. I find that black-and-white prints convey contradictory images better than any other medium by reducing them to the most basic color contrast. My work provides the full spectrum of techniques ranging from renaissance engraving to digital photogravure.” – Michael Goro

Martin Lewis

Martin Lewis, “Tree”, Drypoint, Unknown Date, 32 x 25 cm, Smithsonian American Art Museum

In 1900, Martin Lewis left Australia for the United States. His first job was in San Francisco, painting stage decorations for William McKinley’s presidential campaign of 1900. By 1909, Lewis was living in New York, where he found work in commercial illustration. His earliest known etching is dated 1915. However, the level of skill in this piece suggests he had been working in the medium for some time previously.

It was during this period that he helped Edward Hopper learn the basics of etching. In 1920, Lewis traveled to Japan, where for two years he drew and painted and studied Japanese art. The influence of Japanese prints is very evident in Lewis’s prints after that period. In 1925, he returned to etching and produced most of his well-known works between 1925 and 1935. Lewis’s first solo exhibition in 1929 was successful enough for him to give up commercial work and concentrate entirely on printmaking.

Frank Stella

Frank Stella, “Bene Come il Sale (As Good as the Salt)”, Relief Printed Etching, 1989, Edition of 50, 147.3 x 182.9 cm, Private Collection

Frank Stella’s brightly colored and captivating “Bene Come il Sale (As Good as the Salt)” speaks to Stella’s artistic inclination towards nonrepresentational painting. Figures exist within the same space without any relationship, the only aspect tying the composition together being the beautifully vibrant colors and textures.

One of a series of fifty, this 1989 color etching was printed at the Tyler Graphics workshop in Mount Kisco, New York. A working institution for thirty-seven years, it was known for its printing of mammoth, complicated prints. In addition to work by Stella, the press printed work for both David Hockney and Roy Lichtenstein, among other famous artists. In January of 1985, owner and printmaker Ken Tyler retired at the age of sixty-nine and closed the press; Tyler Graphics continues today as a gallery and a print distributor.

Charles Émile Jacque

Charles Émile Jacque, Untitled, (Man Reading Beside a Skull), Etching, 1866, Attributed on the Plate to José de Ribera

Etching on fine wove (Japan) paper, trimmed with narrow margins and lined on a conservator’s support sheet; Size: (sheet) 13.4 x 12.3 cm; (plate) 12.1 x 11.3 cm; (image borderline) 11.5 x 10.5 cm: Inscribed within the image borderline at the lower left with the artist’s initials, “C. J.” (shown in reverse on the book page) and “ARibera 1621”; numbered outside the image borderline at lower left: “1.”

Reginald Marsh

Reginald Marsh, “Flying Concellos” , Etching and Engraving, Date of Plate 1936, Edition of 100, 8 x 10 in. Collection of the Art Students League of New York

Reginald Marsh is one of the best known chroniclers of 1930s and 40s New York. It has been said that Marsh was to New York what Daumier was to Paris and Hogarth was to London. His paintings, drawings, and prints capture the aura and pace of the ever-changing city at a particularly exciting time in its history.

Marsh was fascinated with the seedier aspects of New York, and he was an obsessive explorer of the great metropolis. It was in places such as Coney Island, the burlesque parlors and dance halls of Fourteenth Street, the Bowery, the streets, and the subway that the Yale educated, financially comfortable Marsh found the subjects he was looking for – Bowery bums, burlesque queens, musclemen, bathing beauties, and streetwalkers. Marsh returned repeatedly to his favorite locations, usually working on the spot with sketchbooks and taking photographs that were used as the source material for completed works back in his Fourteenth Street studio.

William Kentridge

William Kentridge, “Blue Head”, Etching and Aquatint with Two Hand-Painted Plates on Velin Arches Blanc Paper, 47 ¼ x 36 11/50 inches, 1993-1998, Edition of 35

Kentridge was born in 1955 into a wealthy Johannesburg family, descendants of Jewish refugees from the purges and pogroms of Russia and Europe. For generations the family had been deeply involved in politics and human rights issues in South Africa. Both his parents were lawyers, famous for their defense of victims of the apartheid.

In 1976, he attained a degree in Politics and African Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand after which he studied art at the Johannesburg Art Foundation until 1978. There, he met Dumile Feni whose drawings had a major impact on Kentridge’s work.

By the mid-1970s Kentridge was making prints and drawings. In 1979, he created 20 to 30 monotypes, which became known as the “Pit” series. In 1980, he executed about 50 small-format etchings which he called the “Domestic Scenes”. These two groups of prints served to establish Kentridge’s artistic identity, an identity he has continued to develop in various media including theater. Despite his ongoing exploration of non-traditional media, the foundation of his art has always been drawing and printmaking.