The White Palace 1925

Here's James McBey's etching titled, The White Palace. You can almost feel the artist’s hand moving across the plate, scratching and biting into the surface to create this dreamy scene. It feels like Venice emerging from a mist, a ghost of its former self. I wonder what McBey was thinking as he made this? Did he want to capture the grandeur of the palace or the quiet rhythm of the water? There’s a real tension between detail and disappearance here. Look at how he suggests the intricate details of the building on the left, then contrasts it with the tangled lines on the right. It’s like a memory, vivid in some places and fading in others. There’s something about the way he uses line that feels so immediate and personal. Like he's not just showing us a place, but sharing a feeling, a mood, a moment in time. And that, for me, is what makes it resonate. This piece really speaks to the ongoing conversation artists have with each other across time, inspiring new ways of seeing and feeling the world around us.