Les Boeufs 1913

Paul-Emile Colin made this image, Les Boeufs, with some sort of etching or engraving technique. It’s all about lines, you know, like a whole world built from tiny scratches and crosshatches. The texture is key here, the way those marks build up into dark, tilled earth in the foreground, and then soften into distant hills. Look at the sky, there are these stark beams of light cutting through the clouds; it’s dramatic, almost biblical. And then your eye goes down to the two oxen, straining against the plow. You can feel their weight. The artist used the physicality of the medium to create a scene that feels both grounded and transcendent. It makes me think of Käthe Kollwitz, she used a similar approach, digging into the plate to uncover a deeper truth about human struggle and resilience. There's no real right or wrong way to experience art, you know? Just keep looking.