Martin Lewis is the printmaker I stumbled upon that ignited this new enthusiasm. He was a virtuoso, exploring a number of printmaking techniques and many variations of them and producing an incredible variety of textures and effects thereby. He never touched color in printmaking, though he did to some extent in painting. By today’s standards, that means that his prints (all black and white) evoke a certain feel, a film noir kind of allusion. He was masterful at the use of light and dark. Many of his best works were set at night, especially in Manhattan, and evoke the feel of the night, and the city at night in a powerful fashion. His early prints feel somewhat more pedestrian than his later work. He took up painting (especially watercolor) in the 1920s, and it seems to have had positive effects on his printmaking, which became much more textured and nuanced. Is it an accident that it was in this period that he started to do more night scenes?
Today’s print is set in a somewhat suburban feeling location–perhaps one of the outer boroughs, or Connecticut. It is a lithograph. This was a technique he utilized much less than etching. In characteristic Lewis style, he wasn’t content with plain old lithography. He added texture to this print by using a metal stylus to scratch some fine white lines into the pattern laid down with the wax lithograph “crayon” before printing. Like most of the prints I love, this one pulls me in, makes me feel like I am part of the scene. Behold, “American Nocturne” (1937).
