Young Shepherd 1941

Piroska Szanto made this drawing of a young shepherd using sweeping marks of ink on paper. You can imagine her hand moving quickly across the page, trying to capture the likeness of the boy, but also something of his mood. I wonder, was she thinking about other artists when she made this? Maybe she was thinking about Käthe Kollwitz and her drawings of children and working people. Maybe she was trying to bring something of that emotion and feeling into her own work. It is so hard as an artist isn't it? It's hard to capture the feeling, the essence of a person. I'm sure she was trying to get it just right. But that one line, just there along the sleeve, it captures everything she needs to say! Isn’t it funny, the way artists speak to each other like that, across time and space? Each one using their own marks, trying to say something new.