The amazing Stow Wengenroth, who was fortunately as prolific as he was talented.
Cool Forest (1966)
Lithograph
Atmospheric “print noir”: Martin Lewis again (week 3, day 7)
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).
Week 3, Day 1 of share-a-print-each-day: Stow Wengenroth again
Yesterday I broke one of the few rules I set myself. I chose a print that visually I didn’t love. It’s meaningful, the concept excited me because of Frasconi’s Art in service of Justice bent, and the (probably intentional) convergence of the Kent State and Melville poem things. My intention was only to post prints that were visually exciting, that grabbed me viscerally, whether with pleasure or other feelings. The Frasconi thing grabbed my brain, not my gut. Sorry about that. (There are some Frasconi prints I find gut-grabbing, and I’ll probably come back with one of those at some point in the future.)
To make up for that, I’m going to share another Stow Wengenroth print. You may remember him as the lithographer who does mostly New England scenes that are gorgeous and so detailed. It’s so difficult to choose because I have yet to find a print of his that I don’t love. After much deliberation, I chose “Along the Canal”. So evocative! Just looking at the picture make me feel like it’s spring.
[I think this is the Blynman Canal in Gloucester, MA, connecting Gloucester Harbor to the Anisquam River, allowing passage from the eastern shore of Cape Ann to the western without going all the way around]
Day 7: John Biggers. Representation matters.
Friday’s print: Representation matters. I’ve been looking at prints by a number of African-American artists. Some prints aim to illustrate the black experience in America, whereas others seem to be simply about representation. I’ve not been able to learn much about the history of today’s print by John Biggers (1924-2001, a fascinating figure), but it’s a lovely picture. It may simply have been a portrayal of a moment, or it may have been intending to present a picture of a child of color, to contribute to children not thinking of light skin as “normal” or the default. In any case, it’s a charming and beautiful work of art.
Day 6: Grandville, satire on the bourgeoisie
Thursday’s print: In early 1800s France, Jean-Ignace-Isidore Gérard (who used the pseudonym Grandville) made fun of the bourgeoisie in a book collection of lithograph caricatures (Les metamorphoses du jour) portraying everyday scenes with anthropomorphized animals. I don’t have the detailed knowledge of the period nor enough French to understand many of the scenes, but they are beautifully done, and many are charming and funny even without fully understanding the context. These lithographs were printed in black and white, and then colored by hand afterwards. When the first edition sold out, the caricatures were copied into woodblocks for reprinting, and again hand-colored afterwards.
Day 5: Stow Wengenroth, New England Lithographs
Wednesday’s print: Stow Wengenroth (1906-1978) was a prolific lithographer whom Andrew Wyeth once called “America’s greatest living artist working in black and white”. The bulk of his lithographs were New England scenes, including landscapes and seascapes. (Sue Fendrick he lived in Rockport!) He also did a number of New York City scenes. He achieved incredible detail and texture in his prints, all with lines of black and intervening spaces of white. As with Koitsu (yesterday’s artist), I love so many of his prints that I had a very difficult time choosing just one for today, and as with Koitsu, I will likely come back to Wengenroth again. This is called Flat Rock Cove. The texture of the rocks just knocks me over. Some of his prints are so detailed that at first glance they look like photographs, but when you look again, you can see the texture that distinguishes a print from a photo.
