[From the Community Collection, a public trust in Agincourt, Iowa]

MICOSSI, Mario [born 1922]

“Fori e San Sisto in Roma”

1960s

aquatint etching / 12 3/4 inches by 15 1/4 inches

An internationally recognized artist and etcher, Micossi studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. He then moved to New York City where he worked as an illustrator for such periodicals as The New Yorker and Saturday Review. Since the early 1960s, however, Micossi has dedicated himself to printmaking and the refinement of the deep etching technique (which this print employs). Micossi’s work is in major museums such as the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Fogg Museum, Harvard University; the Albertina, Venice; the Stockholm National Museum; the Library of Congress; and the National Gallery of Art, Washington.

Micossi’s blinkered glimpse of the Forum at the heart of ancient Rome as it is seen by a mid-century Modernist. The deep rich velvet tones of an aquatint invite close inspection.