Verdriet 1914

Samuel Jessurun de Mesquita made this woodcut, Verdriet, which translates to Grief, sometime before 1944. What strikes me first is the reductive approach. The figure is created from these deeply carved, parallel lines, which also form the background. It's like he's asking, what can I take away and still have it be something? The texture is key; you can almost feel the resistance of the wood against the blade. Look at the way the lines curve and bend to suggest the form of the body, while also flattening it against the picture plane. The starkness of the medium—the way the knife cuts so directly into the wood—echoes the rawness of grief itself. See how the light catches the figure’s back, how a shadow is cast down the centre - it reminds me of the emotional drama of Edvard Munch's prints. I love how it embraces simplicity and ambiguity, inviting us to bring our own experiences to it. It reminds us that art is a conversation across time, a way of grappling with the complexities of being human.