Untitled (Orchestra) c. 1932

Bernard Sanders etched this image of an orchestra, probably somewhere between the ‘30s and ‘60s. Look at the lines and marks, the sheer force of the shading, and the neutral, greyish palette. You can almost feel Sanders wrestling with the plate, scraping and needling to find the form. I imagine him, head in his hands, trying to work out how to capture the dynamism and movement of all those musicians with their instruments. The orchestra seems to rise up, and the energy of the music becomes visible. The whole thing is full of life, but also somehow haunted, like a memory. The conductor in the foreground reminds me of Beckmann and the way he was always trying to figure out how to wrangle all these different viewpoints into a single, unified, yet still slightly awkward, space. Sanders, Beckmann, me, you... we are all working it out together!