Mutter am Bett des toten Kindes 1911

Here at the Städel Museum is Kathe Kollwitz's 'Mother at the Bed of Her Dead Child', made with charcoal. Just imagine the artist leaning over the paper, almost as if embracing it, each stroke a physical echo of her empathy. You can almost feel the texture of the charcoal, how it grabs onto the page, building up layer upon layer of grief. Look at the dense, almost frantic marks surrounding the mother and child, and then the lighter, more tentative strokes that define their forms. It’s like Kollwitz is searching for a way to articulate something that words just can't reach. I think of Goya, of course, but also Paula Modersohn-Becker, how both artists reached for truth through their drawings. The emotional weight in Kollwitz's work leaves an impact. It reminds us that art can be a form of bearing witness. It can also feel like we are implicated in her grief by witnessing it. It can be hard to look at, but maybe that's the point.