Pommes, verre et couteau (Apples, Glass, and Knife) 1947

'Pommes, verre et couteau', or Apples, Glass, and Knife, was made by Pablo Picasso in 1947 using etching. It's a still life, but not in a boring way. The etching looks almost frantic, doesn’t it? The rapid lines and stark contrast make it feel really immediate, like it was captured in a fleeting moment. The texture is key here. You can practically feel the roughness of the etched lines and the weight of those dark shadows behind the apple and glass. It's funny, there's a real tension between the flat surface of the print and the depth it creates with these simple lines. Look at the handle of the knife, how it seems to fade out of focus – that's a really economical way of suggesting form without getting all fussy about it. Picasso plays with seeing, like Cézanne did. They both ask, how do we really see something? It's like he's inviting us to participate in the act of perception, to piece things together ourselves.