Bowery – Working Proof
Reginald Marsh (1898-1954), Bowery, etching and drypoint, 1928, signed and initialled in pencil lower right by the artist’s wife Felicia Marsh, and numbered 10. Reference: Sasowsky 54, fifth state (of 7). A working proof impression, printed in black on a hand made wove paper, the full sheet with deckle edges, in generally good condition (folds in margins, slight spotting in margins), 6 3/8 x 5 7/8, the sheet 10 x 7 1/2 inches, archival matting.
A fine working proof impression of this rare etching, with plate tone.
This impression is listed in Sasowsky as the fifth state proof numbered 10 and signed by FM. The number of impressions made of the seventh and final state is not known but was probably under a dozen; about 4 proofs were made of the fifth state, and about 6-8 proofs of the other states. A number of proofs can be accounted for in museums, and an additional group of proofs were held in the Marsh Estate (and signed by FM) and are now in the New York Public Library, and thus this print is rarely encountered on the print market.
This is not strictly a Depression era print since it was made in 1928, before the Great Depression. But New York’s Bowery (although an elegant street a century earlier) was an impoverished area, known as New York’s Skid Row, long before the onset of the Great Depression.