The most iconic works by Dutch artist M.C. Escher, including a pair of hands drawing themselves and fish morphing into birds, are familiar to most people. The exhibition of over 100 woodcuts, lithographs, and drawings takes us deeper into both the literal and impossible worlds he created over a career that spanned five decades.
Drawn from the world’s second-largest private collection of Escher’s work, Reality and Illusion includes early figure drawings, lesser-known book illustrations, detailed Italian landscapes, the “tessellations” for which he became famous, and several examples of his signature architectural fantasies in which stairways seem to circle back upon themselves or go nowhere.
From the collection of the Herakleidon Museum, Athens, Greece. One Source Traveling Exhibition organized by PAN Art Connections, Inc.
In Rochester, M.C. Escher: Reality and Illusion is sponsored by the Gallery Council of the Memorial Art Gallery, with additional support provided by Roger and Carolyn Friedlander, Dr. Dawn F. Lipson, Andy and Karen Gallina, the John D. Green Endowment for Contemporary Exhibitions, the Robert Lehman Foundation, the Rubens Family Foundation, the Robert L. and Mary L. Sproull Fund, Ron and Cathy Paprocki, Jim Moore and two anonymous donors.