Oorlogsgeweld 1933 - 1935

This woodcut titled "Oorlogsgeweld" was made by an anonymous artist using bold contrasts of black and white. It’s like they were thinking, "How can I make the starkest statement possible?" The artist really leaned into the physical act of carving, where each gouge into the wood counts. Check out the frenzy of marks that make up the bushes in the foreground, or the jagged edges of the building in the top left corner engulfed in what seems to be smoke. It’s rough, urgent, and so full of energy. I see echoes of Käthe Kollwitz in the way this artist uses the woodcut medium to convey raw emotion and social commentary. There’s an embrace of ambiguity here, a sense that meaning is not fixed but emerges from the interplay of form, content, and viewer experience.