Untitled (January Group No. 1) 1974

Jake Berthot made this charcoal drawing, Untitled (January Group No. 1), on paper and you can see the energy of mark-making, the pushing and pulling, the smudging, the erasing. It is an image born of process. I’m drawn to how the dark charcoal sits on the page, sometimes heavy and opaque, sometimes light and transparent. Look closely, and you'll see the texture of the paper coming through, lending a subtle graininess to the image. Notice that grid on the right-hand side. Is it a window? A building? Or just a collection of lines, a formal element sitting in relation to the rest of the composition? For me, Berthot’s work has affinities with the work of Forrest Bess, another artist who wasn’t afraid to embrace ambiguity and paradox. This piece invites us to slow down, to look, and to question what we see.