On the Point of a Lance, Amongst Us, This Horse's Skull! 1957

Benton Spruance made this artwork called, "On the Point of a Lance, Amongst Us, This Horse's Skull!" using Lithography. There is so much going on in this picture! The figures loom out from the background, the bodies are smudged, and everything is shrouded in a melancholic, somber tone. I imagine Spruance, driven by a sense of urgency, pulled the forms and shapes out of some dark substance. That horse's skull looks like a prop from a dark tragedy, set against a background that could be a landscape or the back of the stage. The figures in the foreground seem to be waiting or planning. I wonder if this is an allegory of some kind, maybe a theatrical rendition of a scene from the war or a commentary on social injustice. Spruance's contemporaries like Jacob Lawrence and Ben Shahn also sought to capture the suffering and resilience of the human spirit, especially during times of conflict. Artists respond to each other across time through this ongoing conversation. The image is ambiguous and full of feeling.