Knezna Ester (Queen Esther) 1998

Jaroslava Pesicová made this intaglio print called Knezna Ester, which means Queen Esther, sometime in the last century. I find myself wondering about the print-making process and how the artist might have worked and reworked the metal plate, using acid to bite into it, slowly building up the image. The dark, moody tones feel biblical somehow, and I’m drawn to the faces of the figures who stare out with these wide-open eyes. I can imagine Pesicová carefully calibrating her marks to achieve the right balance between light and shadow, between detail and ambiguity. What was she thinking about as she produced the subtle gradations on the face of Queen Esther? Was she thinking of Rembrandt or some other old master? Like all artists, Pesicová is in conversation with other artists. She’s not just depicting a scene but also engaging with the history of painting and image-making, offering her own unique perspective on a story, while embracing ambiguity and uncertainty.