Draught Horses 1906

Donald Shaw MacLaughlan made this etching, Draught Horses, at an unknown date, and it now lives at the Art Institute of Chicago. It's an image built up of many tiny marks. I’m interested in the way the horses seem to emerge from the land. Look at the area around their hooves, and the way it blends into the ground. The whole image is built from close, dark hatching, evoking the feel of the earth, the soil, and the heavy labour of both man and animal. It feels as if the image could disappear at any moment, swallowed back into the earth. I'm reminded of Millet's paintings of peasant life, but here, the image is more transient. This isn't about a heroic vision of rural life, but something more fleeting, and perhaps more real.