November 1917

This is Julie de Graag’s “November,” a small woodcut made in 1917. The whole image feels like a concentrated burst of graphic energy, doesn’t it? There is something so immediate, so pleasurable in how the artist has worked with the stark contrast between black and white. I'm really drawn to the way de Graag uses line. Look at the sunflower's center, how the dense, rhythmic network of lines creates this mesmerizing vortex. Then notice how the petals are formed by these bold, confident outlines, almost like stained glass. The whole thing has a kind of raw, handmade quality. It reminds me a little of the Vienna Secession, with their focus on decorative arts and simplified forms, like maybe a Klimt drawing. What's so great about art is that it keeps evolving, borrowing, and riffing off of what came before. It’s an ongoing visual conversation, where artists constantly reimagine and reinvent the world around them.