The Flood
Hilda Katz American
This linocut by Katz uses a prominent skeleton as a compositional element to symbolize the death and misery produced by flooding. Katz reinforced this morbid theme by depicting an angel of death holding a scythe in his left hand. The artist drew straight lines to represent a downpour that falls over a house and drowns a group of people at the bottom left. The emptiness of the background suggests a rural rather than urban environment. This linocut possibly relates to the New Year’s flood of 1949 in the northeastern United States. After heavy rain fell over the Housatonic and Hudson River basins between December 28, 1948, and January 1, 1949, an overflow of water caused flooding throughout New York and New England.
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