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Big Elm

Maker Luigi Lucioni (American, 1900 - 1988)

Collections

American Print Selections

ClassificationsPRINTS

Date1934

Mediumetching

Dimensions9 15/16 x 7 7/8 in. (25.2 x 20 cm.) sheet: 13 x 10 in. (33 x 25.4 cm.)

Descriptionpublished by Associated American Artists, 1936

SignedSigned in lower right of recto in graphite: Luigi Lucioni

InscribedSigned in lower right of recto in graphite: Luigi Lucioni

Credit LineThe Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens. Purchased with funds from the Virginia Steele Scott Foundation

Status

Not on view

Label TextLucioni's technical virtuosity in etching is demonstrated by the details and textures he achieved in his prints. His images of New England were well received by art critics who wrote that his scenes could "carry conviction as portraits of place."

Detractors felt Lucioni's attention to detail reduced his work to mere transcriptions of nature. However, Lucioni felt that he did not copy trivial features. His idea of realism was to depict "not what I see but what I know and feel about objects and Nature." He appreciated etching because it required excellent draftsmanship, which he admired in the work of Michelangelo, Claude Lorrain, and Giovanni Battista Piranesi.

Object number85.17