Lazarus 1964

Sid Hammer made this print, Lazarus, using etching techniques, sometime before 1969. I really get the sense that Hammer was totally unafraid of the material; it’s so raw! The image is dominated by the figure and the cascading lines of the etched medium. These lines read like a torrent, visually overwhelming and emotionally charged, obscuring the figure as much as they reveal it. See how the artist uses line to build form, but also to suggest decay, and maybe even transformation? There’s a real push and pull happening here. Looking at Lazarus makes me think of artists like Käthe Kollwitz, who also used printmaking to express deep human suffering and resilience. But Hammer’s Lazarus has a unique, almost gothic sensibility, a sense of something both ancient and utterly contemporary. Like, what does it mean to be resurrected in our day and age? It's a question, not an answer.