Albert H. Wiggin - James McBey

A portrait etching of American banker Albert H. Wiggin, created by Scottish artist James McBey in 1929.

This etching by the Scottish artist James McBey depicts Albert H. Wiggin, a prominent American banker and art collector. Executed in December 1929 in New York, the work captures the sitter with the economy of line characteristic of McBey's mature printmaking style. The artist employs a series of quick, confident strokes to define the facial features and the structure of the suit, while leaving significant areas of the paper surface untouched to suggest light and form.

McBey was a self-taught etcher who gained recognition for his ability to convey character through minimal detail. In this portrait, the focus remains on the subject's direct gaze and the subtle play of shadow across his face. The background is rendered with sparse, vertical hatching, which prevents the composition from feeling cluttered and keeps the viewer's attention fixed on the sitter. The plate bears the artist's signature and the date, along with a handwritten dedication in the lower margin, which provides a personal context to the print.

As a practitioner of the Etching Revival, McBey favoured the immediacy of the copper plate. His technique relies on the interplay between the dark, incised lines and the white space of the paper. This approach creates a sense of spontaneity, as if the portrait were captured in a single sitting. The work is an example of the artist's skill in portraiture, demonstrating his capacity to balance technical precision with a sense of individual presence. The print reflects the aesthetic values of the period, where the clarity of the etched line was prized for its ability to convey both physical likeness and psychological depth without the need for excessive tonal modelling or elaborate background detail.