Aquatint: From Its Origins to Goya

How an ingenious printmaking technique became a cross-cultural phenomenon in Enlightenment EuropeDriven by a growing interest in collecting and multiplying drawings, artists and amateurs in the eighteenth century sought a new technique capable of replicating the subtlety of ink, wash, and watercolor. They devised an innovative and versatile new medium—aquatint—which would spread in use across Europe within a few decades, its distinctive dark tones making possible a remarkable variety of ing...