Rainy Day on the Beach (Regentag am Strande) 1918

Lyonel Feininger made this stark woodcut print, Rainy Day on the Beach, with a knife, gouging out the image from a block of wood. I imagine him really digging into the surface, the black ink contrasting sharply with the white paper, kinda brutal, kinda simple. I can almost feel the rain coming down in diagonal lines, the figures are solitary, maybe a little lost in thought. They're reduced to basic shapes, almost like paper dolls, giving the scene a sense of alienation. Feininger was part of the Bauhaus movement, and you can see that influence in the way he simplifies forms and reduces the world to its essential geometry. You know, it reminds me a little of Munch, but with less angst and more geometry. It's like he's trying to find some kind of order in the chaos of the modern world. But what do I know? Maybe he just liked rainy days at the beach. Either way, it's a powerful image, full of feeling.