Untitled [verso] 1969

Saul Steinberg made this untitled drawing with pen and ink on paper, though we don’t know exactly when. It’s a landscape, but one rendered in an abstract style, somewhere between architectural drawing, diagram and cartoon. The landscape seems to be populated by anonymous figures who are dwarfed by the scale of what looks like an imposing institutional building. Linear perspective conveys the feeling of a constructed environment. Steinberg was born in Romania but lived most of his life in the United States, having fled Europe during the Second World War. His work often reflects on the alienation and anonymity of modern life, especially in urban environments, so it would be interesting to know the circumstances in which this sketch was made. Scholars of Steinberg’s life and work can piece together a better understanding of this image by looking at his biography and other drawings. It might also be fruitful to compare this to the work of architects and urban planners in the post-war period.