Archbishop's Palace, Liège, Antique Steel Engraving after L.J. Wood, circa 1875

A shaded courtyard of the palace at Liège, surrounded by an arcade on sturdy stone columns. The columns are the striking feature: each swells into a bulbous, baluster-like shaft carved with patterns and is crowned by a richly sculpted capital supporting the pointed and rounded arches. Through a broad archway at the center, the view runs into a vaulted passage and out to sunlight beyond. The courtyard is busy with everyday life: women in shawls stand talking together at the left, a seated woman rests against a column, a couple stands talking in the passage and a man in a cap reclines on the steps at the right.

The lettering reads "Courtyard of the Archbishop's Palace, Liège". The building is the palace of the former prince-bishops of Liège in Belgium, whose sixteenth-century courtyard columns, each carved differently, are among the most celebrated pieces of Renaissance architecture in the Low Countries. The painter is credited as L.J. Wood (Lewis John Wood, an English painter of continental street and town scenes) and the engraver as J.J. Crew. The imprint Cassell, Petter and Galpin, the London publisher, appears beneath the title.

This steel engraving is a fine study in light and stone. The engraver gives the columns full, rounded volume and distinguishes the rough masonry of the walls from the worn cobbles of the yard.

Architecture lovers will appreciate it in a study, an office or a hallway, perhaps in a dark wood frame that suits its weighty stonework.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.