Landscape

Emil Orlik's graphic depicts a view from the high bank of the Nile on a typical passenger boat with Latin rigging. The boat is at the quay. On the lower mast, a sailor is furling the sail. The boat's delicate, asymmetrical shape fills the near foreground, while the view of the other bank of the Nile barely draws on the horizon. The view of the felucca accompanied the landscapes of the Nile and those of the eastern Mediterranean and the Red Sea. Orlik took up this exotic subject because he was fascinated by the culture and art of both the Near and Far East. He shared this fascination with many of his contemporary artists. The graphic is the result of a trip Orlik took to Egypt in 1921. The asymmetry of the composition refers to Art Nouveau, but the motif of a light boat and vast, airy space is often found in the works of Cubists, for example, André Derain, or Expressionists, such as Max Slevogt. The graphic was made in 1915 using the mixed etching technique, dry point, roulette and watercolour, reproduced on thick velin paper and signed in pencil.Emil Orlik was born in 1870 in Prague and died in 1932 in Berlin. He studied privately in Munich, at the school of the portrait and genre scene painter Heinrich Knirr (1862-1944) and the academy with the painter of historical scenes Wilhelm Lindenschmidt the Younger (1829-1895) and the graphic artist Johann Leonhard Raab (1825-1899). He worked mainly in Prague from 1894 to 1904 and from 1905 as a professor of the State Teaching Studio at the Museum of Arts and Crafts in Berlin. His passion was travelling. He visited Europe and the USA, Egypt, Nubia, Ceylon, China, Korea and Japan, where he learned wood engraving from local masters. He was a versatile artist; he painted, drew, created graphics, photographed, designed scenery and theatrical costumes. He willingly took up the subject of portraits.

Ewa Gwiazdowska