Old House, Quai d'Ivry 1906

This is John Marin’s Old House, Quai d’Ivry, a print made by etching lines into a metal plate. You can see how he revels in the process of making marks. He doesn’t fuss too much about blending or softening edges, instead he lets the marks stand alone. The density of the lines helps create tonal variation in the image; see how he uses the greatest concentration to suggest the darker areas of the building, and then the thin sparse lines in the sky. Look closely at the small boat in the foreground, it's tilting, awkward, with lines suggesting the wood grain, and the way it sits heavily in the sand. The buildings in the background have a similar wonkiness to them. Marin’s approach is often compared to the abstraction of the cubists, and you can see the influence, but I also think there is something endearingly slapdash about the way he renders a scene. There’s an energy and lightness that gives the print a sense of immediacy and joy.