Etchings of Paris: The Street of the Bad Boys
1854 · etching
Meryon, Etchings of Paris: The Street of the Bad Boys, 1854. etching.
The Cleveland Museum of Art · Bequest of Grover Higgins
How to look at a Meryon
- Half-close your eyes until the lines vanish. Count the values that remain. Then open them and count the layers that made each one.
- Follow the eye level across the Apse print: the bridge, the quay and the figures all confirm it.
- Find the one place where the deepest black touches untouched paper. That is the focal point.
