San Francisco, California Street by Max Pollak

San Francisco, California Street by Max Pollak

San Francisco, California Street

Max Pollak

Title

San Francisco, California Street

 
Artist

Max Pollak

  1886 - 1970 (biography)
Year
c. 1944  
Technique
color softground etching & aquatint, printed a la poupée. 
Image Size
16 7/8 x 14 7/16" platemark 
Signature
pencil, lower right 
Edition Size
XII/XX (aside from another proposed edition of 100) 
Annotations
pencil titled and editioned 
Reference
UC 1947 exhibition #79; Triton catalogue #62 
Paper
ivory wove 
State
published 
Publisher
artist 
Inventory ID
12558 
Price
SOLD
Description

Max Pollak did this large color intaglio around 1944, using the tonal lines that softground etching can create and added color using aquatint, printed a la poupée.

The viewer's eye is directed down California Street, past the pagoda of the Sing Fat Company building at Grant Avenue to the right down to the San Francisco Bay where the the Bay Bridge is just visible in the fog. Colorless skyscrapers loom in the background. The view is akin to being on a roller coaster.

Max and Friedl Pollak traveled across the United States before settling in Sausalito, California in 1938. As they had traveled Max captured the cities with his impressionistic color intaglios; New York, Cincinnati, Detroit, Chicago, Washington DC, New Orleans, etc.