Life and Death 1972

Eduardo Nery made this striking graphic piece, called 'Life and Death', most likely as a print, and it's a real head-turner. There's something about the clean lines and limited palette that just grabs you, right? I love the way he's used these flat blocks of colour – a deep blue, reds, and stark whites – to create such a sense of depth and movement. You've got this almost architectural form looming over the scene, and then this sequence of white silhouettes that could be leaping dogs or cats. They're bursting out from the side, stretching out, and then they seem to fall downwards... And then, there's that box down below. It’s like a full stop, but it also opens up a whole load of questions. For me, the whole thing has this feeling of something being caught in a loop, a pattern of action and consequence, of life and... well, you know. Artists like Josef Albers come to mind, in the way Nery uses colour to create optical effects and visual rhythms. It's a clever piece of image making, one that really gets you thinking.