Combat
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View on museum website →Medium
engraving and softground etching in black
Dimensions
plate: 40.3 x 50.2 cm (15 7/8 x 19 3/4 in.) sheet: 43.5 x 53.3 cm (17 1/8 x 21 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Ruth Cole Kainen
Accession Number
2012.92.80
Art Historical Context
**Combat** (1936) by Stanley Hayter is a striking black-ink print, created through the meticulous techniques of engraving and softground. Measuring 40.3 x 50.2 cm on the plate, work exemplifies Hayter's mastery at his Paris-based Atelier 17, a hub for experimental printmaking he founded in 1927. Engraving involves incising precise lines directly into a metal plate, while softground etching captures subtle textures by pressing paper into a softened ground—methods Hayter innovated to push prints beyond mere reproductions into dynamic, original art. Created amid the turbulent 1930s, as Europe ed...
About the Artist
Stanley William Hayter
Stanley William Hayter (1901–1988), born in Hackney, London, to painter and sign-maker William Harry Hayter, initially pursued a scientific career, earning a degree in chemistry and geology from King's College London. He worked as a research chemist for the Anglo-Persian Oil Company in Abadan, Iran, from 1922 to 1925, painting portraits of colleagues in his spare time; an exhibition of these upon ...