Programma van de volksdans- en volkszangavond, 'A.J.C. - afdeling Amsterdam' before 1933

This is a woodcut poster for a folk dance and song event by Fré Cohen, and even though we don’t know exactly when it was made, you can feel the process the artist went through to bring it to life. The colours are blocked, earthy – like the dance itself. The orange-brown areas, maybe printed first, add warmth and energy to the blocky black, like an underpainting. Look at the figures, how they're rendered in simple shapes and lines. It's all so physical. You can almost feel the hand of the artist carving away at the wood, making these bold marks that define the dancers, the musicians, the whole scene. Take the figure at the front for instance, there’s something about the way their checkerboard clothing has been rendered which makes the entire image appear to be vibrating. You can imagine Cohen in the studio, thinking about the dancers and musicians and then using these traditional techniques to bring it all to life. Like the work of Frans Masereel, this print reflects a very particular vision of art, as a shared language between artists, and a process of working toward something that is never quite finished.