Parkiet (Twee parkieten) 1927

Samuel Jessurun de Mesquita made this small woodcut, Parkiet, probably sometime in the early 20th century. The process is so clear here, isn’t it? You can see the marks the artist made, digging into the wood to create this little bird. The texture is what gets me. Look at the body of the bird, how it’s made up of these close parallel lines. They give it a kind of volume, but also this almost comical feeling. It’s like the bird is wearing a tiny striped sweater! Then there’s the background, this grid of horizontal lines that makes the bird seem even more present, but also trapped. It reminds me a bit of some of the German Expressionist woodcuts, like Emil Nolde. They were also interested in this raw, almost brutal way of making images. But Mesquita has a lightness, a kind of humor, that’s all his own. In the end, it's art about the way we see, and how that seeing is always changing, always open to new possibilities.