Springtime (Le Printemps) 1923

Andre Dunoyer de Segonzac made this etching, Springtime, using black ink on paper. I love that the whole scene is built from small marks, like he’s constructing the image bit by bit, scratch by scratch. You can really feel the physicality of the process, imagining him hunched over the plate, digging in with his tools. The texture is amazing, especially in the trees. Look at how the lines swarm and cluster to create depth, like a storm cloud about to burst. It makes the branches feel alive, all bristling and energetic. And then there's that lone figure on horseback, smack in the middle of it all, like a tiny punctuation mark in the chaos of nature. This print really reminds me of some of the early landscape etchings of Rembrandt, that same love of line and light. It’s a reminder that art is just an ongoing conversation, artists speaking to each other across time and space.