Master Impressions from the UAMA Collections: Night
September 24, 2008 - February 1, 2009
Samuel Palmer The Lonely Tower, 1879
etching on paper
Museum Purchase with funds provided by
the Edward J. Gallagher, Jr.
Memorial Fund
1983.019.001
The depiction of night presents the artist with a set of distinctive
representational challenges, particularly how to convey a recognizable
scene cloaked in the obscurity of darkness. Night scenes require
experimentation with minimal sources of illumination, demonstrated most
dramatically in Caravaggio's influential chiaroscuro paintings. In order
to achieve subtle gradations of light and dark, printmakers have
explored various techniques, including the heavy inking of plates, the
creative use of etched or engraved lines, and experimentation with
printing processes such as aquatint and mezzotint.
Night scenes have their origins in the representation of well-known
Biblical and mythological stories, as in Hendrik Goudt's The Flight
into
Egypt, John Martin's The Creation of Light, and Willem
Akersloot's Ceres Changing Stellio into a Lizard. Vernacular
nightscapes, exemplified here by Jan van de Velde the Younger's
Nox (Night), emerged from Dutch artists in the 17th century.
Traditionally, night has been regarded as a time of fear, and darkness
itself has been associated with evil, crime, witchcraft, and terror. But
artists have also long evoked night as a time of mysterious wonder and
beauty, and of imaginative, dream-like visions, as is the case in Samuel
Palmer's The Lonely Tower. Within night images, the moon has
functioned as an object that arouses poetic praise, amorous yearning, or
serene meditation; its effects on human behavior have been portrayed
humorously, as in Emmanuel de Ghendt's La Nuit (Night).
Perhaps due to its inherently enigmatic, shadowy qualities, nighttime
has inspired special fascination and contemplation. Samuel Palmer wrote
admiringly of William Blake's portrayal of night in his woodcut
illustrations for an edition of Robert Thornton's The Pastorals of
Virgil: "There is in all such a mystic and dreamy glimmer as
penetrates and
kindles the inmost soul, and gives complete and unreserved delight,
unlike the gaudy daylight of this world."
- Susannah Maurer, Assistant Curator
Master Impressions from the UAMA Collections:
This series of small, rotating presentations showcases the exceptional
breadth and depth of the UAMA Old Master print collection. These
selections offer focused consideration of a particularly significant
artist or theme, and elucidate some of the most influential developments
in the Western printmaking tradition.
