Skyline 1928

Arnold Rönnebeck made this lithograph of a city skyline using delicate, scratchy marks, a study in black and white. It must have been amazing to stand at the edge of the city and capture the essence of the buildings, the water, and the bridge overhead. I’m thinking Rönnebeck felt something like awe when he looked out on this view, and I imagine he wanted to capture the energy of the modern city. The bridge feels so close, pressing down on the buildings, as the water almost vibrates. I love how the marks almost dissolve into pure tone and how the scratches are both descriptive and atmospheric. There’s something kind of radical and immediate about choosing a simple tool, like a lithographic crayon, to describe the urban landscape. I can see Rönnebeck thinking about other artists who were making images of the city at this time, like the Ashcan school painters, or even some of the early modernists. There’s an ongoing conversation between artists, a give-and-take that happens across time, one inspiring another's creativity, and that’s what I think about when I look at this print.