Frederick Mershimer
Long Island City
2005

Name: Long Island City
Brand: Frederick Mershimer
Price: 7900 USD
Availability: InStock

About the Item

Long Island City Contemporary artist Frederick Mershimer created this oil painting on a wooden panel in 2005. The painting (wood panel) is 10.25 x 21.25 inches (26 x 54 cm). This painting is framed in a solid maple wood flat-faced molding with splined corners. "Long Island City" is signed in the lower right corner in oil and on the verso in pen. Frederick Mershimer received a BFA from Carnegie Mellon University, where he majored in painting and drawing. After moving to New York in 1983, he began to study printmaking at The New School, Pratt Graphics Center (1984 – 1987), and Manhattan Graphics Center (1988 – 1992). Mershimer was initially drawn to the slow, direct, and laborious mezzotint process because it echoed his approach to drawing. In 2007, Stone and Press published a catalog raisonné of his work, titled "Frederick Mershimer Mezzotints 1984 – 2006." In 2007, he received an Artist Fellowship Grant from the New York Foundation for the Arts, followed by a 2009 Individual Support Grant from the Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation. “Mezzotint engraving is a relatively obscure form of printmaking that creates dramatic chiaroscuro, with white highlights emerging out of rich velvety dark tones. Italian for “half-tone,” mezzotint was a 17th-century improvement on engraving’s tonal cross-hatched lines because it can produce an even gradation of tones. Known as the black manner, its unique process entails working from black to white. An initial “roughing up” of the copper plate with a rocker tool forms a textured field of copper burrs, which prints as flat black. Lighter, grey passages and white highlights are created by slowly erasing the texture. My images explore the dynamic between the city’s architecture and our place within this imposing environment. Having always been unsure of how to understand the world around me, I find a sense of control by creating dramatic settings in which events can unfold. I enjoy the night because it is a place to escape the expectations of society and to reinvent one’s self. Through night scenes, I’m able to capture the city’s darker, more mystical, and romantic undertones. Using photographs I construct scenes by eliminating objects or changing the perspective to better draw the viewer into the piece. Weaving together the disparate elements into a seamless quiet balance, I manipulate lighting and shadows, fine details, texture, and other pictorial elements to conjure a sense of place and reveal the emotional core of my work.” – Mershimer

Creator:

Frederick Mershimer (1958, American)

Creation Year:

2005

Dimensions:

Height: 11.5 in (29.21 cm)Width: 22.5 in (57.15 cm)Depth: 1.38 in (3.51 cm)

Medium:

Wood Panel,Oil

Movement & Style:

American Realist

Period:

21st Century