Donald Shaw MacLaughlan, born - Fields of Asolo - unknown - T-Shirt

Fields of Asolo is a drypoint etching of rolling pastoral land around the hill town of Asolo in northern Italy, rendered in sepia brown on cream.

Visual Elements & Composition

The image fills a rectangular landscape frame, with sepia brown dominating roughly 85 percent of the surface and cream providing the light tones of sky and open ground. Tall poplar trees rise along the composition, while hillside villages of stone buildings sit against rolling hills that fade toward distant mountains. Two small figures anchor the lower left: one seated, and one standing with a staff in the foreground. The date 1913 appears within the work.

Meaning & Symbolism

The work presents the agrarian character of the Veneto countryside, where fields and villages have been worked for centuries. The poplars and terraced slopes signal a settled, cultivated land, and the still figures suggest a quiet pause in daily labour rather than action. Donald Shaw MacLaughlan, a Canadian-American printmaker, made the piece in the early twentieth century, when he was known for translating landscape into refined graphic lines through traditional etching and engraving. Fields of Asolo reflects his interest in the atmosphere of European places and the lasting appeal of the Italian rural landscape.

Carried Across the Chest

Fine etched detail reads best up close, and a tee brings the scene to where it is seen at conversation distance. The sepia and cream palette sits easily on a plain shirt, letting the fields, trees and distant hills stay the focus. Wearing the piece puts a quiet Italian countryside view on the body, much as the original invites a slow look at its lines.