Dunst (mist)

Description

Copper etch­ing, soft ground and aquatint, 16×10 cm (plate size), 2021. Limited edi­tion of 8, numbered and signed.

This is a view from Most Blagoveshchensky, or Annunciation Bridge, towards the port of Saint Petersburg. The bridge has a curi­ous and far-flung rela­tion to etch­ing. At the time of its con­struc­tion it was the first per­man­ent con­nec­tion across the River Neva, and one of its lead­ing engin­eers was none oth­er James McNeill Whistler’s fath­er. The young­er Whistler would later claim to have been born in Saint Petersburg instead of the actu­al Lowell, Massachusetts – “I shall be born when and where I want, and I do not choose to be born in Lowell.” He would vis­it the city, though, and study for some time at its academy, just across his father­’s bridge.