Focus on this artwork and explain the Preliminary studies.
There are over 100 penciled preliminary studies for the painting in the Kupferstichkabinett Berlin. Movement studies show the individual work steps of steel processing in the rolling mill, as well as overall views of the blast furnace plant in different lights, individual machines and tools. Menzel also created a gouache titled Self-portrait with a worker at the steam hammer (Leipzig, Museum of Fine Arts , no. 1972/6), where he sketches the man at the steam hammer in the background of a machine shop. The final painting was created in the studio with the help of models for the different postures. The publisher Wilhelm Spemann wrote about this work: "In this description of the iron rail forge from Königshütte in Upper Silesia, the highest degree of naturalistic observation is combined with virtuosity of presentation and a strong feeling for painterly effect. The scientific accuracy of the description cannot be pushed any further, the liveliness of the expression cannot be increased. There are numerous drawn studies that Menzel made for this picture of modern cyclops, in the work itself the drawing recedes behind the mastery with which the tremendous difficulties of air and light painting have been overcome.”
Kupferstichkabinett Berlin Berlin