Georgio Morandi - etchings

Giorgio Morandi (1890-1964) was an Italian painter and etcher. His main style was creating still life and landscapes. He was familiar with the work of Renoir,  Monet and Cezanne aswell as finding inspiration from Giotto,  Pierre della Francesca and Uccello. Morandi was very particular in the way in which he worked,  he would spend a considerable amount of time contemplating each element of his work.  When setting up a still life, it could take him weeks to chose the correct objects for his focus.  He would consider the shape, colour, angel and arrangement of the objects,  then he would look at composition and colour balance. Between the 1920s and 1930s Morandi produced his etchings,  where some of his work was influenced by the fascist regime. At this time, fasism had a large impact on social life and the arts.
Morandi was able to produce highly detailed etchings because of his technique in mark making and colour balance.  He was also great at using variations of black and white to make realistic looking objects. He was very talented being able to create form and depth through his observation of still objects.

I like the contrast of colour to create a variation of tone. The image almost looks photographic with the careful attention to detail. 



This piece uses interesting shapes for the buildings,  it almost adds an energy and a positive feel to the image.



I like this image because there is a 3 dimentional feel to this image due to the attention to the angle of the bridge.  A lovely scene.

This is another piece I felt was full of attention to detail.  By careful use of mark making,  the tree stands out from the background to create a picture like image.

This was created during Morandis mature period where it was said the objects started to lose their contour.  The shapes are more loose and curved so they do not seem as realistic as his previous work. This is one of my favourite prints because it has a personal quality to it rather that a "perfect" image.