Three Dancing Girls with a Goat 1947

Mortimer Borne made this lovely, delicate etching of dancing girls and a goat in 1947. The reddish-pink lines are fluid and dance across the surface of the paper as they describe the figures, who are surrounded by trees. I can imagine Borne carefully and precisely drawing into the metal plate, then biting it with acid before pulling a print in his studio. What was he thinking about as he drew the dancing figures? Was he thinking about Matisse’s dancers, that great circle of women who seem to be in a world of their own? Was he thinking about the nymphs of classical art, or women dancing in his local community? Look how he’s varied the pressure of the lines to create texture and volume. See how the etching feels both classical and modern? Artists are always in conversation with one another, riffing on ideas and forms. As the great painters of the past inspire those of the present, so Borne might inspire a new generation of printmakers.