Orvieto 1926

William Evan Charles Morgan made this etching, called Orvieto, in 1926. Can you imagine him with the plate, carefully scratching away to produce this image? There’s such a sense of detail here, I feel I could reach out and touch the crumbling rock face. The texture must have been built up, line by line, mark by mark, to conjure the scene, a small town nestled on top of a huge craggy cliff. I wonder how long it took Morgan to create this? It’s almost like a landscape drawing, built up of short, dark lines. And like a drawing, each line feels precise and deliberate. There's a real sense of place, and the etching technique captures the timeless atmosphere of the Italian countryside. The landscape is almost romantic, like something out of a Renaissance painting. It reminds me how artists are in an ongoing dialogue, constantly exchanging ideas. And the best art embraces that ambiguity.