A View of the Stairs of the Vatican

After returning from several years spent in Italy, the French printmaker George-Francois Blondel settled in London in order to take advantage of the English taste for images of Italian sites. This is one of a series of eight prints he published in 1766 depicting imagined and real Italian interiors. Using the relatively new technique of mezzotint, which creates velvety, dark tonal areas, as well as low vantage points, Blondel created towering, awe-inspiring spaces. For special patrons, he printed the plates in sepia ink, rather than in black; the CMA’s set includes two of these unusual sepia impressions.