The Hunter

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett uses a variety of woodengraving tools and techniques to create this "large" landscape in a small format. Using cross hatching, gouging, dots, short strokes and lines he creates the illusion of daybreak (or sunset) in blacks, grays and white. A hunter on a horse is highlighted against a large dark tree.

Though he learned relief printmaking in South Bend, Indiana, Bennett grew up in what was a wild and unsettled part of Washington state, the land which is now 'Bennett School' in Bellevue. Bears, deer, mountain lions and other wildlife were abundant. Most of the Bennett family neighbors were Samish Indians whose activities became the background for some of the books he later authored and illustrated. This image may well have been used in one of these books.