Block Printmaker Kupka

        František Kupka (Czech, 1871-1957) was a painter during that wild and crazy artistic period when romantic realism was giving way to a roiling ferment of Art Nouveau, Futurism, Cubism, color theory, and a new art -ism every year.  He became one of the first of the European artists to produce purely abstract work, and I have for you today a couple examples of his abstract wood block prints.  Printmaking was an unusual medium for Kupka, but he chose it for a series of 26 pieces entitled “Four Stories in Black and White”  (or “Four Stories of White and Black,” depending on the translation.)  The “stories” are essentially visual themes and variations, in which Kupka developed his theories about abstraction.

        I really like the contrast of solid white, solid black, and pattern in the first one here, which is my favorite of the whole series, I think.  The second piece evokes something of dynamism, as if the triangles are flying around and ricocheting off the edges of the block.  I don’t expect ever to become a convert to the church of abstraction, but I do like some of Kupka’s work very much.

        And here’s the digest of previously-featured K printmakers:

Kallem, Henry

Kawauchi, Rie

Kirchner, Ernst Ludwig

Klein, Deborah

Kollwitz, Käthe

Krenek, Carl

[Pictures: Plate 16 from Four Stories in White and Black by František Kupka, 1926;

Plate 11 from Four Stories in White and Black by Kupka, 1926 (Images from  frantisekkupka.eu).]

A-Z Challenge, all posts for the letter K