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Italian Landscapes - Real and Imaginary Landscapes
Not all of Escher's landscapes faithfully reflect
the physical world. For example, The Bridge (March 1930) borrows numerous
elements from nature, but the work remains a fantasy, placing these elements
in an imaginary framework.
(Escher, in Escher, 1989, p. 35).
On the other hand, some of his landscapes seem to be imaginary when in fact
they are real representations of Italian architecture.
Italian Landscapes - Real and Imaginary Landscapes
Mark Veldhuysen made the following remarks
about Atrani's architecture.
"Like most towns and villages on the Italian coast, the Atrani infrastructure
is very confusing for anybody who doesn't live there. Streets look like dead
end streets but continue when climbing some stairs, at a completely different
level. The roof of one house is the first floor of the next. What looks like
someone's front door can actually be the entrance to a square with various
side streets.
Italian Landscapes - Real and Imaginary Landscapes
Atrani seems to be the worst of all villages,
a gigantic maze with stairs and little alleys everywhere.
With the help
of a friendly policeman, and despite some fifteen local who all wanted to
help us in different directions to choose from, we found the famous covered
alley. Although it was a bright, sunny day with temperatures soaring into
the upper nineties (near 40° Celsius), it almost looked like nightfall.
Hardly any light came through, which did not make taking a photograph easier."
(Veldhuysen, 1994, p. v)
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