Rockwell Kent excelled as a painter and printmaker, producing wood and metal engravings, lithographs, and some woodcuts.  He produced his first print in 1919 at the suggestion of Carl Zigrosser.  His prints feature precise, deliberate lines and dramatic contrasts of light and dark.  He uses symbolism to express ideas and feelings about mankind, destiny, and the meaning of existence.  Kent's print oeuvre falls into three phases.  The first is characterized by intense, mystical works influenced by extended stays in Newfoundland and Alaska; the second illustrates daily life in the Adirondacks of New York and in Greenland; and the third can be considered a period of social consciousness.  The Faller (1942) is a chiaroscuro wood engraving on maple in two colors, black and tan.  It was commissioned by the Weyerhaeuser Timber Company as Christmas gifts for their Pulp Division customers in 1943.  The finished drawing in pencil and pen and ink is in the Zigrosser Collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Kent was born in Tarrytown, New York.  He studied architecture at Columbia University, leaving to study art with William Merritt Chase at his Shinnecock Hills School and then at the New School of Art under Robert Henri and Kenneth Hayes Miller.  He also apprenticed under Abbott Thayer in New Hampshire.