Joseph and His Brothers V

Peter Lipman-Wulf made this print, Joseph and His Brothers V, using etching, a process of working with acid to ‘draw’ into a metal plate. It's a dense composition, with figures piled on top of each other. Look at the lines, they have this scratchy quality. See how they define the forms of the bodies, their faces, and their hands. There’s a real sense of touch here. And the whole image has a kind of all-over-ness; no hierarchy, no real center. The expressions on their faces are so interesting, all these different emotional states coexisting. And in a way, this work puts me in mind of another artist, Max Beckmann. Like Beckmann’s work, Lipman-Wulf’s piece creates its own unique space through the power of line and form. There’s no right way to read it, and I kind of love that.