Landscape, City Outskirts 1880 - 1885

Santiago Rusiñol created this drawing, titled "Landscape, City Outskirts," using graphite. The composition presents a study in contrasts, dominated by a wide-open space that evokes both emptiness and potential. Linear perspective draws the eye along a road marked by parallel lines, leading to a horizon where the cityscape blurs into the sky. The artist's repetitive, directional strokes give shape to the undulating terrain and create a sense of depth and movement. Rusiñol’s drawing challenges our perception of space. Through the strategic use of line and shading, the artist plays with the semiotics of landscape representation, pushing the boundaries between the urban and the natural. Ultimately, it’s the drawing's structural arrangement—the stark contrast between the detailed foreground and the undefined background—that invites ongoing interpretation. What does it mean to exist on the periphery, neither fully within nor entirely outside?