Girl with Mask 1950

This is Benton Spruance’s "Girl with Mask", made sometime in the mid-20th century using lithography. Look at how the grayscale tones merge, separate, and suggest form! I can almost feel his hand guiding the lithographic crayon over the stone, building up the image stroke by stroke. The girl’s expression is so poignant, vulnerable. What’s she thinking as she holds that mask? What does the mask itself represent? I get the sense that Spruance was grappling with these questions too. I bet he was trying to work something out, wrestling with those shades of grey. This reminds me of Goya's prints—that dark and mysterious mood, but with a modern twist. In painting, like life, we're all wearing masks, trying to figure out what's underneath. It’s this vulnerability, this exploration, that connects artists across time and space.