Bathers c. 1930

Salvatore Pinto made this print called "Bathers," and what strikes me is how the whole image hinges on the contrast between these dense, velvety blacks and the stark white paper. It’s a real balancing act. Look closely, and you'll see how the artist uses the white to carve out shapes and forms. The negative space is just as important as the figures themselves. There's this one bather, reclining, her white limbs almost glowing against the black sand. It's like a dance between darkness and light, mass and void. Pinto isn't just showing us a beach scene; he's exploring the very essence of seeing. The flat shapes remind me a little of early 20th-century modernists like the German Expressionist woodcut artists. But Pinto brings his own quirky vision to it. It’s a scene teeming with life, a world of visual possibilities. It feels so simple, yet the more you look, the more complex and intriguing it becomes.