Frank Mason painted this painting in memory of one of the Art Students League’s famed instructors, Joseph Pennell. The printing press depicted in this painting was used extensively by Joseph Pennell for both Pennell’s personal use, and to produce work for friends, including Pennell’s close friend, James McNeill Whistler.

Pennell believed that there was just as much that went into the printing of a copper plate as in the drawing and biting of it, which he would often execute directly on the plate whilst standing in a bustling New York City intersection.  Mason arrived at the League almost a decade after Pennell’s passing but the two were kindred spirits.  Both Mason and Pennell were constantly experimenting with new tools, mediums and preparations to push the limits of their craft.

Pennell believed in capturing “the bigness, the feeling of things” as he put it.  Mason would constantly evoke the sensation of wonderment both in ASL’s Studio 7 classroom and teaching plein air painting in Vermont in the summers.  

In this interior scene, natural light streams into Mason’s Little Italy studio where Joseph Van Goethem, a friend and art dealer of Mason, poses next to the printing press.  Van Goethem, also an admirer of Joseph Pennell, recalled a passage from Edward Larocque Tinker’s biography of Joseph and his wife, Elizabeth Robins Pennell, stating: “Just before he (Pennell) died he begged to be carried to his window for one last look at the view of Manhattan that he loved and had often sketched and painted. The doctor thought it unwise, but I have always regretted that Mr. Pennell was deprived of this last pleasure.”   

Van Goethem observed how Frank was inspired to paint “Joseph Pennell’s Printing Press …and Joseph Pennell’s window!”

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