Los Angeles Scene

Albert Abramovitz

Albert Abramovitz did this wood-engraving / woodcut around 1937 while he was working for the Federal Art Project (FAP) which was part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) part of the New Deal engineered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Great Depression.

Social Realist printmaker Abramowitz, whose prints documented the Depression in New York, chose the large homes and rooftops of the Hollywood Hills in the 1930s to create this composition, using wooden-graving and woodcut tools. He creates a wide variety of lines and patterns to achieve the dynamic balance in the print; crosshatch, long, straight lines and short, patterned lines, diagonals and gouged dots. The image elements change from black on white to white on black.

These homes and mansions, built on the slopes in Los Angeles, were the center of the soirées during the 30s, the Golden Age. They have been subject to fire, eathquake and landslides over the decades but they continue to be rebuilt and remodeled to current standards to help withstand such disasters.