Man with Cube Woodcut by M.C. Escher 

M.C. Escher (American, 1898-1972), 20th Century.  Woodcut on paper, depicting man with cube, monogrammed in plate u.r, signed l.l.; 2.5 x 2.5 in. 

M.C. Escher was a printmaker, graphic artist, and illustrator, best known for incorporating impossible puzzles or constructions into his works. This woodcut features a man contemplating a cuboid, also referred to as an impossible cube. This work was likely a predecessor to the man holding an impossible cube at the base of the towered building in one of Escher's most renowned works, the lithograph Belvedere (1958). In that work, the man is viewed from the opposite side, but is posed in the same manner, wears the same clothes, and holds an impossible cube while looking at a drawing of a cube that is placed on the checker-tiled floor at his feet.