Portrait with Scissors and Nightclub

This layered image in which we see both a close-up of a woman holding a pair of scissors and a broader view of a bar interior is typical of the compositions of David Salle. The double-exposure effect prompts us to contend with two reactions at once—one to a confrontational image and one to an image where we have to tease out the subject and any narrative. Salle made this color woodcut in conjunction with a team of Japanese woodcut craftsmen who were brought together in the 1980s by the San Francisco collaborative print workshop Crown Point Press for the purpose of collaborating with artists from the Western tradition.