Child's Dress 1935 - 1942

Bessie Forman created this drawing of a ‘Child’s Dress’ with graphite and watercolor. The delicate rendering of the dress, cardigan, and accompanying sketch evokes a sense of nostalgia and tender care. Forman meticulously builds the dress form using a gridded pattern in shades of green. The grid not only provides structure but also softens the dress to emphasize its delicate nature. Note the subtle balance between precision and fluidity, which destabilizes the fixed meaning of geometric patterns, allowing them to suggest qualities like softness and comfort. The composition subtly plays with figure and ground, depth and surface. The flatness of the paper contrasts with the implied volume of the clothing, creating an interplay between the two and three dimensions. This tension invites reflection on the very act of representation and the translation of the material world into an artistic expression.