Franco I
1962
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
lithograph (stone) on Nacre paper
Classification
Portfolio
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Rosenwald Collection
Accession Number
1964.8.2169.10
Art Historical Context
Antonio Frasconi's *Franco I* (1962) is a striking lithograph created on stone and printed on Nacre paper, a luxurious, iridescent sheet that enhances the work's luminous quality. Frasconi, auguayan-born American printmaker renowned his mastery of graphic arts, drew from traditional lithography techniques—drawing directly onto the stone with greasy crayons or tusche to exploit the medium's rich tonal range and velvety textures. This piece belongs to a portfolio classification, suggesting it was part of a curated series, now housed in the esteemed Rosenwald Collection at the National Gallery of...
About the Artist
Antonio Frasconi · 1919–2013
Antonio Frasconi (1919–2013) was a Uruguayan-American artist renowned for his masterful woodcuts, which blended bold graphic power with poignant social commentary. Born on April 28, 1919, aboard a ship between Argentina and Uruguay to Italian immigrant parents, he was raised in poverty in Montevideo, Uruguay, where his mother worked as a seamstress and restaurant manager to support him and his two...