Red, White & Blue 

Curator: Abraham P. Hankins' "Red, White & Blue" offers an intriguing example of modern printmaking. It seems the piece involves woodcut techniques. Editor: Immediately, it strikes me as quite bold—a dynamic tension between those clean geometric shapes and the texture implied in the print. Curator: Absolutely. It evokes a sense of, dare I say, abstracted patriotism. The colors are immediately symbolic, tapping into a shared cultural language. Yet, the figure remains fragmented, almost deconstructed. I’m curious about what emotions the artist meant to trigger in the viewers. Editor: It feels inherently political, but not in a direct, representational way. More in how it challenges traditional artistic norms, mirroring a broader shift in societal values and the rise of modernist aesthetics. I see abstraction as political because it removes authority from conventional modes of art making. Curator: I think you’re spot on. If we consider the period when modernism takes full swing, art enters the public arena like never before. Art is no longer confined to the church, court, or private salon, and enters popular spaces, reflecting new ideas about who the viewer is, what matters, how identities can be defined through abstraction as much as by the realistic portrayal. This artwork appears as more conceptual rather than nationalistic. Editor: The composition is fascinating. The interplay between red, white, and blue certainly sparks thoughts about national identity. Could it be commenting on ideals versus the lived experiences, a dichotomy embedded in the symbolism itself? Curator: Precisely! Red, White, and Blue are heavily symbolic in Western iconography. You have, on one hand, associations with liberty and purity but they could also embody themes of power, conflict and the body through the figure we see here. What I admire is how such limited imagery holds such possibilities, sparking unique ideas of meaning. Editor: A fascinating study in the power of abstraction and symbolic colors. Curator: Indeed; a rich, if concise, dialogue on visual language and its ever-shifting interpretations.