The Escape 1964

Michael Mazur made "The Escape," an etching, at an unknown date. The blacks are so rich, dense, and velvety here, and they're offset by the stark white of the paper. It’s so immediate. You can sense him, or the person who this is a picture of, making a break for it. Mazur is really playing with this tension between representation and something more slippery. See how the figure is both clearly defined, but then dissolves into these almost ghostly lines? It's like he's capturing a moment of transformation, or maybe a memory fading away. Look at the way he renders the footprints. They are so precise, and then blurred or smudged. There's a push and pull between control and spontaneity. Think of Goya or Käthe Kollwitz, artists who also knew how to make black ink sing with sorrow and resistance. Art is always this conversation across time.