In Birmingham Jail 1963

Warrington Colescott made this print titled In Birmingham Jail. I see a stark image, the blacks and oranges really hit you, and the lines forming those prison bars are so unforgiving, aren’t they? You can almost feel the weight of the metal, dividing and confining. Colescott is telling a story here, but not in a literal way. He has created a kind of psychological space for the viewer, or at least, for me. It must have taken great courage to create a picture like this. Colescott had to find a way to express the horror, the injustice, but also the spirit of resistance and the shared humanity of those who are incarcerated. The rough, uneven textures he has conjured through the etching process seem to echo the complex layers of emotion inherent in the scene. We can also sense the artist's solidarity with other artists. Visual artists are constantly referencing and building upon the ideas of their predecessors. Each artwork is a contribution to an ongoing dialogue that helps to generate new ideas about the world.