1/21/2024 0 Comments Geometric fish tessellation![]() ![]() He and Jetta were fascinated by the Moorish designs which they spent three days sketching. Surprisingly, the company accepted the offer and the Eschers received an essentially free cruise of the Mediterranean (Locher, Veldhuysen).ĭuring this trip, Escher visited the Alhambra again, but he was much more intrigued by the palace this time. In return for the service, Maurits promised to create advertisements for the company and give them a number of prints from the sketches he would make on the trip. Maurits and Jetta both missed the Italian countryside and were unhappy with their new location, so in 1936, they made a deal with the Adria Shipping Company to take them around the Mediterranean on ship. Though, in 1935, political tension forced their family to move to Switzerland (Schofield). Maurits worked in Italy intensively for eleven years and during this time the Eschers had two sons, George and Arthur. With these new drawings, Escher began to experiment more freely with the use of different vantage points, sometimes looking both up and down at the same time, as in High and Low (see Picture Gallery). After traveling during the summer, Escher would come back to his studio in Rome and begin the process of transforming these sketches into full drawings, and then into prints ( National Gallery of Art ). For the next several years, Maurits traveled all over the country drawing and sketching, always gathering new ideas for his artwork. ![]() They were married in 1924 and settled in Rome. In 1923, during another one of his travels through Italy, Escher met his future wife, Jetta Umiker, in the town of Ravello. These patterns inspired him to create his first tessellated drawing, Eight Heads (see Picture Gallery), but he worked with these only for a short while because they took far too much time to complete and he was rarely satisfied with the final product (Smith). He was very moved by the Moorish tiling that covered the walls and during his visit made several sketches of them. That same year, he visited the Alhambra, a Moorish castle in Grenada, Spain. In 1922, Escher left Haarlem to travel around Italy with a small group of friends. Many of the abstract, experimental pieces he created here would be implemented into parts of his later, more famous work. This was very uncommon for the time and type of school, and Maurits was very fortunate to have had this opportunity. In the three years of Escher's attendance there, Mesquita taught him as much as he could about wood-cut printing and he also encouraged Escher to experiment extensively with different ideas (Locher). With permission from his parents, Escher did this and began studying graphic arts and printmaking. After viewing some of Escher's work, Mesquita encouraged him to change his course of study from architecture to the graphic arts. Here, he met graphic arts teacher, Samuel Jessurun de Mesquita. In 1919, Escher moved to Haarlem and began classes at the School for Architectural and Decorative Arts. After reviewing these prints, Holst advised that Escher attend an architectural school (Ernst). Haagen then sent some of these prints to a fellow professor, Roland Holst. van der Haagen, found his work very intriguing and knew that he had incredible potential, so he decided to direct Escher in making prints from linoleum cuts. The only classes that he enjoyed were his art classes, which is where his talents were first recognized. Though, Escher's work is extremely mathematical, he was a very poor student in high school, especially in mathematics and science courses. When observing Escher's wide range of work, these foundational skills and traits show through predominantly as the basis of his drawings. These early acquired skills helped Escher build his self-confidence and taught him the importance of preciseness and also how to keep a steady hand (Schattschneider).Įscher was very meticulous and neat as a child, as one of his early school teachers observed, “…I remember the care with which this little boy had selected the shape, quantity and size of his slices of cheese, so that, fitted one against the other, they would cover as exactly as possible the entire slice of bread” (Robertson, O'Connor). Also, in the small town of Arnhem where he grew up, he worked as an apprentice under carpenters and wood-workers which would be very helpful in the future when he started to work with prints from wood cuts. As the son of a civil engineer, growing up, Escher acquired many qualities from his father that would give him a head start in the field of graphic arts – he was exposed to drafting from a young age and was taught many fundamental drawing skills through this. He was the youngest son of Sara and George Escher and had four older brothers named Arnold, Johan, Berend, and Edmond. Maurits Cornelis Escher was born in Leeuwarden, Netherlands on June 17th, 1898. ![]()
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