Pedestrians on Brooklyn Bridge
John Marin
1920–1929
- Medium
- Graphite on lightweight, smooth, tan wove paper, laid down on ivory wove card (all edges trimmed)
- Dimensions
- Primary support: 13.6 × 19.3 cm (5 3/8 × 7 5/8 in.); Secondary support: 24.7 × 29.7 cm (9 3/4 × 11 3/4 in.)
- Genre
- graphite
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago
Tags
drawings (visual works)graphiteprints and drawingpaper (fiber product)
About
The upward thrust of the Brooklyn Bridge’s two Gothic arches and the powerful pull exerted by its network of high-tension cables, depicted so effectively in this taut drawing, embodied Marin’s concept of weights and balances. Formally, the great bridge also offered a framing device for the skyline and challenged the artist’s long-standing interest in linear systems.
