Fontamara V 1947

Fayga Ostrower made this print, Fontamara V, by carving into a block, probably wood or linoleum, and then inking and pressing it onto paper. Look at the darks and lights. The image emerges through this process of reduction, scraping away at the surface. I’m drawn to the man at the center, see how he’s holding his hands together? It's almost as if he's wringing them in distress, like he can't quite find a way out of something. There's this tension between the clarity of the black ink and the ambiguity of the situation, and that’s what makes the piece so compelling. Ostrower reminds me a little of Kathe Kollwitz, both grappling with social issues in print form. The beauty of printmaking is that it allows for the reproduction of images, spreading ideas far and wide. It’s a conversation across time, a back-and-forth between artists and audiences, and ultimately, a reminder that art is never truly finished, but always open to interpretation.