Profile #2 1953

Nahum Tschacbasov’s ‘Profile #2’ is a print that layers shapes, faces, and symbols in monochrome. It is, in essence, an experiment in fractured portraiture. You can see the artist searching, shifting, and feeling his way through this complex composition! I imagine Tschacbasov, maybe in his studio in New York, wrestling with the etching plate. Look at the angular lines that cut across the surface, dividing faces and forms into geometric planes. The texture feels like a coded message, a language of symbols waiting to be deciphered! See the fish near the bottom? The bird at the top? Tschacbasov was part of a generation that was obsessed with cubism and surrealism, playing with abstraction to access deeper truths. The tilted heads and fragmented features in Profile #2 remind me of Picasso, but there's a playful, graphic quality to the mark-making that’s all Tschacbasov's own. It’s like he's inviting us to piece together the puzzle of identity, reminding us that we are all complex, multifaceted beings.