The Ship Wreck May (God) Have Mercy c. 1920s

John Held Jr. made this image, "The Ship Wreck May (God) Have Mercy" without a date given, using what looks like woodcut or linocut, a method where the image is carved into a surface, inked, and then printed. Look at the sky. Those swirling marks, they aren’t just clouds; they are a mood, a feeling. The stark contrast between black and white gives it a kind of graphic punch, but it's the details, the tiny figures clinging to the wreckage, that really get to me. You can see the labor in the marks, the artist’s hand, wrestling with the material to create this scene of chaos and desperation. I find the use of line particularly interesting. It’s so deliberate, so stylized, that it transforms the scene into something almost dreamlike, despite the very real drama of the shipwreck. It reminds me a bit of Rockwell Kent, that same boldness and clarity, but with an added touch of dark humor. It’s a powerful image, one that stays with you, bobbing around in your mind like a piece of driftwood.