History isn't the whole story, though; the show features a number of splendid prints such as Horter's aquatint Rainy Night China Town; Spruance's lithograph The People Work - Night; and Steth's Beacons of Defense, also a lithograph.
These and many others combine evocative social-realist imagery of the Depression period with the exacting technique that characterized printmaking when Thrash and his colleagues were active.
Thrash is one of several African American artists in the show, but it isn't only about black life. The prints cross cultural boundaries to describe lives of ordinary people - for instance, Thrash's Shipfitters and Gallagher's Moving Day, depicting two miners pulling a cart of furniture.
Ron Rumford, director of Dolan/Maxwell Gallery, organized the show; half the prints are lent by the gallery and are for sale. Despite this overlay of commercialism, the exhibition inaugurates the Fleisher's new space in fine style.
Center for Works on Paper, 705 Christian St., 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays and, when classes are in session, 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays; 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays. Through Dec. 15. 215-922-3456 or www.fleisher.org.
Puryear in print. Martin Puryear is known as a sculptor, but his exhibition at Temple Gallery presents a suite of prints that relate to Cane, a 1923 novel by African American writer Jean Toomer.
Puryear created 10 prints for a limited-edition reprinting of this classic of the Harlem Renaissance by Arion Press of San Francisco.
Toomer's novel explores the essence of black culture in the South, primarily through vignettes of female characters. Seven of Puryear's prints address those characters not as illustrations but as parallel, abstract interpretations.
