Newstand, New York 20th century

David Gilbert's etching, "Newstand, New York," probably involved him lugging his metal plate around the city, looking for a scene to capture. Imagine him, his eyes narrowing at this newsstand bustling with the energy of the city. It’s all there—the looming architecture, the ordinary people, the news, all etched with such fine lines, it’s like he was trying to hold onto a moment that was already slipping away. You can feel the grit of the city, the shadow of the buildings. The newsstand itself, overflowing with papers, blurring into abstraction. Gilbert manages to capture the ephemeral nature of news, how today’s headlines become tomorrow’s forgotten stories. That lamppost on the right, with its delicate curves, feels like a nod to earlier times, to the tradition of printmaking. What would Gilbert make of our world? I wonder if he’d find beauty in the chaos of the internet? I think he would.