The Sloop Inn 1904

Sydney Lee’s woodcut, The Sloop Inn, gives us a simplified nighttime scene with flat planes of colour. It’s a process of reduction, literally, as the artist carves away at the block, figuring out what to leave, what to ink, what to print. The blocks of colour are really interesting. The blue of the sky, the pale green-grey of the building facades. The way the light falls is so blocky and unnatural. There’s no blending, just hard edges. You can see the texture of the wood grain coming through, which makes it feel handmade and gives it a sense of time. The overall effect is both tranquil and slightly unsettling. Look how he’s carved out the windows. It gives the impression of light within, a warm contrast to the cool palette. And the figure in the foreground, almost a silhouette, adds a narrative element, a sense of mystery. It reminds me a bit of Edward Hopper, that same feeling of isolation and quiet observation, but with a graphic, almost flattened, approach.