Man reikt een vrouw een papier met scherven aan before 1945

This drawing, whose date is unknown, by Hans Borrebach, appears to have been made with ink and watercolor. What strikes me most about this image is how the figures are rendered with such clean, decisive outlines and flat washes of color, like cartoons. It's intriguing to see the shards of paper being offered, almost ritualistically, by the man to the woman. The paper itself is rendered with such care and precision, a real contrast to the quick and loose brushstrokes of the blue wash above. This one mark evokes a sense of something ephemeral. I'm also reminded of artists like Philip Guston. Guston, who embraced the process of artmaking in all its messy, contradictory glory, explored the depths of human experience through a deliberately clumsy and improvisational approach to painting. Just as in this drawing, the ambiguity and open-endedness of the work invite us to project our own meanings and interpretations onto it, embracing the possibility of multiple readings and fluid identities.