House on 13th Street c. 1942

Lucille Jeffries made this stone print of a house, sometime in the first half of the 20th century, with a real knack for capturing the spirit of a place. The whole image is built up from marks, a kind of controlled chaos. Look at the sky behind the house; it’s not just a blank space but a mass of tiny, energetic lines. The texture almost feels like it's moving, kind of mirroring the actual feeling of clouds and weather. And the house itself? The details are sharp, precise, but there's also a looseness, a sense that Jeffries wasn't trying to create a perfect replica, but instead, trying to convey what it feels like to really see a place. It reminds me a little of Charles Burchfield’s American landscapes, with their expressive lines and slightly spooky mood. It’s like Jeffries is saying, "Here's a house, but it's also a feeling, a memory, a story." It’s this blend of observation and imagination that makes the print so alive.