Prelude to Troy (No. 2) 1974

Romare Bearden made this intaglio print, Prelude to Troy (No. 2), using etching and engraving to create a monochromatic world. The matrix of thin lines feel like a map that you could travel across, where figures are built up out of an accumulation of marks. Bearden seems interested in building up the image bit by bit, allowing the image to find itself through a process of making. There’s a gorgeous overall texture to the image as it moves between open areas and heavily worked passages. Up in the tree, the artist’s hand feels really present; it’s almost as if the tree itself is made up of the energy of the artist as he works. Below, you get these groupings of figures in a mythical landscape, but rendered in a very modern, immediate way. Bearden’s willingness to embrace abstraction within representation reminds me of Picasso and the Cubists, or maybe even Matisse. It’s this tension between abstraction and figuration that gives the image its energy. Ultimately, it's not about resolving the tension, but about embracing the possibilities it opens up.