Complaints 1914

Helen Hyde made this print of a small child surrounded by a gaggle of geese, using woodblocks and ink, probably sometime around the turn of the last century. You can see the artist's hand at work here. She’s carving shapes from the blocks of wood, laying down delicate veils of color, one by one. I imagine her in her studio, surrounded by tools and materials, carefully considering each mark, and how it will interact with the others. Look at how she made the geese! Each one is slightly different, with its own personality. It’s as if she knew them personally, their honks and quirks. The geese encircle the little person, who seems unperturbed by the noisy complaints, carrying on with a gourd in hand! Hyde was deeply inspired by Japanese printmaking, but she brought her own sensibility to the process. She’s playing with the push-and-pull between flatness and depth, between representation and abstraction. And, like all artists, she's in conversation with the artists who came before, riffing on their ideas and techniques, and pushing the boundaries of the medium.