Ilusha's Father (Book X: The Boys, facing p.416) 1949

Fritz Eichenberg made this lithograph, "Ilusha's Father", to illustrate a scene in Dostoyevsky's *The Brothers Karamazov*. The approach to mark making is really striking, using fine, closely spaced lines to build up the image, almost like a kind of emotional cross-hatching. There's a real physicality to the medium here. You can see how the texture of the paper interacts with the ink. Look at the way the light catches the figure's hunched back, and how the dense, dark lines around him create a sense of claustrophobia. I’m drawn to the father's hands, pressed against the wall. They’re rendered with such care, conveying both desperation and a kind of stoic resignation. Eichenberg’s work often grapples with themes of social injustice and human suffering, echoing the concerns of artists like Käthe Kollwitz, who also used printmaking to powerful effect. It’s a reminder that art is always a conversation, a way of grappling with the world’s complexities.