Ha'nted 1932

Curator: Oh, I love the mood in this one. Something feels both incredibly familiar and a little unsettling. Editor: That’s probably due to its subject. Here we have Martin Lewis’s 1932 etching, "Ha’nted." It portrays two figures with a lantern walking past a shadowed building at night. What jumps out at me is its stark portrayal of working-class anxieties during the interwar period. Curator: Shadow anxiety is the best way to describe it! What a beautiful and effective image. The building looms so large, its shadow stretching out like some…ominous premonition, don't you think? Editor: Definitely ominous! Lewis captures the quiet desperation of the era, especially given the rise of authoritarian regimes at that time. Curator: It makes you wonder what the relationship is between the men, what they are talking about. This intimate darkness is full of suggestions, don’t you think? Editor: I think the darkness in many of Lewis's prints reflects a broader cultural reckoning with class and societal inequalities that came to a boiling point, especially in urban environments during this period. It would have certainly made them the "ha’nted" subject of political discourses! Curator: Interesting. Do you think Lewis titled it like this deliberately, maybe to sort of suggest how burdened they were? You’re giving me new ways of looking at his works. Editor: It might just be a playful jab or he might have just simply been responding to these shifts through his work—making commentary, and perhaps critique—but I certainly think about Lewis’s interest in depicting this societal transformation every time I approach it. Curator: See, and I had it down as, two guys late for poker! All about context, right? Well, either way, thanks, this really enriched my experience of this work. Editor: And thank you for bringing this artist into focus, helping to highlight those subtle connections between visual representation, power and society, which are as relevant now as ever before!