Going My Way? 1946

Editor: Robert Vale Faro’s print from 1946, "Going My Way?", seems like a puzzle, or maybe a map of something. What’s your take on it? How do you interpret this work? Curator: It’s interesting that you see it as a map. To me, it feels more like a disassembled cyborg. Faro created this print post-World War II, and I wonder if we can interpret the fractured geometric and figurative forms as a reflection of the fragmented societal landscape and individual identities after such a catastrophic event. Do you see any hints of that in the composition? Editor: That makes a lot of sense. There is a sense of everything being in pieces and layered over itself. The organic with the clearly mechanical forms… it is disorienting. Curator: Exactly! Think about the societal shifts of the time: increasing industrialization coupled with anxieties around technology. Could this print be a visual representation of humanity's evolving relationship with machinery and technology? Is it about progress or a loss of identity? How do these intersecting themes resonate today? Editor: So, Faro’s using abstraction, almost surrealism, to show the fractured and shifting nature of the world at the time? Curator: Precisely. And beyond the visual deconstruction, it invites us to consider the socio-political implications: What pathways were open to people, and who had the power to direct those pathways? "Going My Way?" could be read as a sardonic question posed to a society grappling with its future. Editor: Wow, I hadn't thought about it that way. Seeing it in the context of the post-war world really brings new meaning to the print. I will have to examine this a few more times! Curator: Art can be so enlightening in this respect, bringing so much value to our modern world, in terms of cultural perspective and new perspectives.