'Chance Meeting' is a dry point etching print by Martin Lewis and was created in the early 1930's. The subjects are two figures, male and female, who have happened upon each other in the setting of a public sidewalk at the entrance of a storefront. It may be a dichotomy in terms to call the piece, "Idealized Urban Realism," though Lewis' work does harmonize well with the Urban Realist movement surfacing in this period with artists such as Edward Hopper. It also has a very idealized and stylistic quality not unlike the work of artists like Roy Liechtenstein in a much later time period. At a glance, 'Chance Meeting' is a simple work intended to tell a story with minimal detail and it is difficult to distinguish any definite pattern in the composition. With careful inspection however, the viewer can discover an order in the placement of objects, the existence of symmetry, and perhaps a much deeper meaning to the piece through the interpretation of symbolism.

The palate used in the piece is simply black and white, with the exception of the illusion of shades of gray created with the shading technique, cross-hatching. This intensifies the use of light and shadow in what definite

ly could be called chiaroscuro. The presence of a single, intensely bright directional light creates areas of extreme contrast that could be called tenebrism. An extreme variety of lighting techniques can be found, as some objects are lit from the side, and others are almost completely backlit, creating more of a silhouette than a distinguishable three-dimensional shape. Shadows in the recesses of the male figure's face starkly oppose highlights upon his brow and jaw line. Lewis seems to be experimenting with what might be realistic lighting conditions at night on a typical city street, and exaggerating the results in the interest of style. An area of focus is created in the foreground by the intensity of light falling off abruptly as distance increases. Balance in lighting is achieved with the occasional splash of light in a reflective surface, and the existence of smaller, less accentuated lights in the background of the print.

A definition of order and balance surfaces when we begin to examine the shapes created by the long shadows cast by the light radiating from the window of the storefront. These shadows find their angles in their own sort of vanishing point located at the light source somewhere to the inside the building and out of sight. The placement of this light source almost mirrors the vanishing point on the opposing side. The overlapping of lines stemming from these two points creates a sort of diamond shape typically associated with two-point perspective. At this point we can see that several other objects in the scene also conform to this diamond shape. Draped lengths of cloth suspended from the canopies of the shops seem to lean into the upper inward sloping angle, While the subjects themselves fit into the geometry of the lower angles. The symmetry of these angles almost frames a point between the two main subjects, where in addition to a sign advertising newspapers, perhaps a sort of understood emotional magnetism

Some common words found in the essay are:
Roy Liechtenstein, Martin Lewis, Urban Realist, Edward Hopper, 'chance meeting', Realism Lewis', , dress somewhat, martin lewis, urban realist, background print, male figure's, diamond shape, picture plane, light source, public sidewalk,
Approximate Word count = 1314
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)