Fritz Eichenberg (1901 - 1990)

Subway, 1934

Wood engraving on wove paper

From the edition of 200

Signed in pencil, lower margin

Image dimensions: 6.25 x 4.75 inches

Sheet dimensions:  11.75 x 9 inches

Printed by Ernest David Roth

Presented in a hand-finished spline joined mahogany wood cap profile frame with an ebonized stain.  Deep bevel conservation rag matting, protected with museum anti-reflective uv-filtering glass.

Eichenberg left his native Germany for New York after the election of Adolf Hitler in 1933. He arrived in the United States during the worst of the Great Depression and, in response to challenging times, wrote about himself and his fellow artists eschewing abstraction and adapting social realism, which reflected the "difficult problems of the day." His efforts are on view in this depiction of weary subway riders, their downtrodden state underscored by the juxtaposition of the smiling woman in the advertisement to the left with the downcast woman seated below it.