Replica of a Carriage c. 1940

Emilio Zito made this line drawing of a horse drawn carriage, probably on paper, sometime in the 20th Century. Look at the quality of the lines; they’re consistent and confident. It looks like Zito knew exactly what he wanted to capture. For me, that’s so much of artmaking: knowing what you want to express and how to do it. The drawing has a certain technical quality, as if it were a blueprint for a real carriage. It is full of details – the wheels, the seats, the drapes. There's a textural, even emotional, quality to these details, like the drawing is trying to tell a story, not just present an object. The lines give a weight to the carriage. I can’t help but think of Picasso and his line drawings of bulls. Zito’s drawing reminds me that art can embrace both precision and ambiguity. Both pieces demonstrate how artists can use simple means to convey complex ideas.