“449”

4 x 5”
hand carved wood block engraving with black ink

By Sal Iaquinta, MD

Sal Iaquinta, MD, is a Head and Neck Surgeon at the San Francisco Medical Center in CA. He is a self-taught artist and began doing wood engravings a few years ago. His influences are Roy Lichtenstein, MC Escher, and Salvador Dali. A woodblock is carved for each color to be used in the print; the print is then made by building the colors one on top of the other with the final printing in black. In this case only one block was used.

This portrait of MC Escher is titled “449” because Escher only made 448 wood engravings, mezzotints, and lithographs. This engraving is the self-portrait he never made; it is modeled after a photograph taken late in his life.

Other engravings and paintings of Dr Iaquinta’s may be viewed at: www.RockJWalker.com under the pseudonym “IQ”