Hemlock 1928

John Farleigh made this wood engraving called Hemlock sometime in the middle of the 20th century. It's a dense scene, full of tonal contrasts. There is something compelling about how Farleigh plays with light and dark to create texture and form. He seems to be carving out a world where the shadows are as important as the light, almost as if he's sculpting the image from the darkness. Take, for example, the foreground leaves, they’re sharply defined and almost glow against the dark backdrop. It’s a graphic sensibility, a starkness that reminds me of German Expressionist woodcuts, like those by Kirchner, but Farleigh’s approach feels a little more organic, less tortured. I like how this print sits between representation and abstraction. It’s clearly a landscape, but the high contrast and flattened perspective push it towards something more stylized, something more about the process of seeing than the thing itself.