Ash Wednesday falls this year on March 1. In the weeks leading up to Easter, I will be featuring new images of Christ on the Cross from the Sacred Art Pilgrim Collection by international artists in a variety of media. My first selection in this Lenten art series is a small format drypoint by Czech Artist and Poet Bohuslav Reynek. Rendered in the artist's typically agitated linework, the print has the appearance of a slightly altered Rorschach inkblot. Reynek has reduced the usual company of eyewitnesses to the Crucifixion to a pair of Roman soldiers wielding two of the "instruments" of Christ's Passion. The figure to our right holds the spear that was thrust into his side; the figure to our left offers him a sponge soaked in vinegar at the end of a reed. This might well be a nocturnal scene with two glowing orbs in the heavens, bringing to mind the Gospel accounts of "a darkness over all the earth (Luke 23:44, KJV)" as Christ was dying on the Cross. This new print of the Crucifixion joins five other scenes of Christ's Passion in the gallery of the Reynek profile page in the Sacred Artists Section. (John Kohan)