Sleeping Car II 

James L. Hendershot made this print, Sleeping Car II, using etching, a printmaking technique. The dense network of lines that defines the image is achieved by drawing into a waxy ground covering a metal plate. This exposes the metal, which is then bitten by acid. The longer the plate sits in the acid, the deeper the lines become, and the more ink they will hold when printed. Hendershot has expertly controlled this process to create a tonal range from light to dark, evoking the interior of a train. In its time, rail travel was a great liberator, allowing relatively easy movement. Yet the artist also suggests a degree of confinement here, echoing the repetitive labor required by the industrial age. The very act of etching, with its laborious and controlled gestures, could be seen in light of such issues. The artist’s hand, guided by the demands of the process, mimics in its own way the rhythms of the machine.