A History of Art part 59

It was pretty sunny today, but never got to 40 degrees, so outdoor mural painting was postponed in favor of working in the Studio. I moved to the left of the models to cut the Masereel inspired city. People who have seen the block assumed this would be a particularly difficult section to cut, but I knew from experience that the drawing was the tough part. The whole thing took less than 2 hours. I took a rubbing afterward, found that the buildings looked pretty much like his original print, but the figures were not quite as clear and distinct. I put a few more cuts into the block to outline some of the more prominent figures (which is what Masereel did himself), and a second rubbing looked better.

The remaining pieces of the tower still require further resolving. I made a quick sketch of the prison section to take home and consider. The big issue is deciding the light and shadow. It's not always clear in Piranesi's originals where the light sources are coming from, and my prison is only partly based on one of his. I'll try to figure it out over the next day or so, because it may affect how I decide to cut this section.