In Camera Caritatis from Eastern European Prints
Jaroslav Šerých
Czech, 1923–2014
1969, published 1970
An etching made with aquatint and embossing in which Jaroslav Šerých conjures a dreamlike assemblage of ritualized forms to evoke memory, myth, and a searching spiritual presence.
You are first arrested by the split field — a dense, pitch-dark lower zone packed with tiny, cryptic objects and textures, and above it three elongated, haloed figures rising from a pale, smoky sky so that the image feels like a private, uncanny ritual seen through mist.
Created in 1969, this print shows Šerých expanding intaglio practice in postwar Czech art by combining printmaking techniques with surreal and folkloric motifs to make prints that carry tactile, psychological, and collective memories.
Medium
Etching, embossing and aquatint, printed in color
Dimensions
plate: 15 1/16 × 11 5/8" (38.3 × 29.5 cm); sheet: 22 × 16 3/4" (55.9 × 42.5 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Gift of Andrew and Mary Stasik
Accession
625.1970.2
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
