Celebration in Central City 1937

Helen Louise Beccard made this lithograph, *Celebration in Central City*, in 1937. Lithography is a printmaking process using a flat stone or metal plate on which the image areas are worked using a greasy substance so that the ink will adhere to them, while the non-image areas are made ink-repellent. Beccard has mastered the medium, using its capacity for fine detail to depict a dense crowd on a city street. What I find fascinating is how the image highlights the everyday experiences of working-class people. We see the storefronts of a barber, a liquor store, and a cafe, suggesting a community centered around basic services and social gathering places. The mass of people evokes both a sense of collective identity and the individual lives that make up the city. This is where the “making” of the artwork comes in. Beccard is not just representing a scene; she’s capturing the essence of a community through the labor-intensive process of lithography, elevating the ordinary to the extraordinary.