A painter captures the humanity amid the dirt and darkness of a New York alley

 

“Canada-born Impressionist artist Ernest Lawson made his name at the turn of the 20th century as a landscape painter—often depicting the still-rural Washington Heights neighborhood where he lived from roughly 1898 to 1908. Yet when he turned his eye to the grit of city streets, he captured something equally evocative. The 1910 painting he called ’New York Street Scene’ reveals the dirt and darkness of a narrow lane or alley, the discolored backs of buildings made uglier by the fire escapes hanging off them.But we also see horse-pulled carts, vendor stalls, and vague figures on the sidewalk on the left—bits and pieces of humanity in the hidden pockets of the urban, industrial city. ...”

Ephemeral New York