Naakte vrouw in heuvellandschap 1913

Lodewijk Schelfhout made this print, "Naakte vrouw in heuvellandschap," which translates to "Naked Woman in a Hilly Landscape," sometime in the early twentieth century. It's all about the push and pull between the figure and the ground. See how the landscape is not just a backdrop? The figure and the landscape seem to be made from the same cut of cloth. The trees and hills are reduced to facets, like some kind of cubist geology, and the body of the woman is similarly described in flat, angular planes. Look at how the hatching marks create a texture that blurs the lines between the woman and the scene. Schelfhout’s use of shading gives depth, but it also feels like a flattening, like everything is being pressed onto the same surface. It’s like the whole picture is breathing, expanding and contracting. And if you think about it, that tension, that flattening, is very Cézanne, right? That’s the conversation Schelfhout’s having.