Faubourg des Longues Peines (La Pauvre Eglise) 1929

This is a print, made by Georges Rouault, who laid down dark, scratchy marks to create this image of a Poor Church. You can see the dark ink pulled across the page, it’s rough and immediate, like the image came together in a flurry. This kind of process really puts the focus on the making. The whole print is about texture and tone, you can see the way Rouault used the marks to create shadows and depth. Look how the road in the foreground almost pulls you into the image, right up to the heavy, dark mass of the church. The figures in the foreground are formed out of similar marks; like they’re part of the same landscape. The moon in the top left looks kind of like a hole in the sky. Rouault was always exploring themes of faith, suffering, and redemption in his work. You can see a similar use of heavy black lines and a somber mood in the work of Kathe Kollwitz, who was working around the same time, and was also concerned with images of working people. Ultimately, images like this remain open-ended, embracing ambiguity rather than offering easy answers.