Small Cravat 1935 - 1942

This work, Small Cravat, was made with graphite on paper by Dorothy M. Gerhard. I’m thinking about what it must have been like for Gerhard, hunched over her drawing, squinting to see the lace, trying to capture its delicacy with just a few pencil strokes. I love the mix of precision and uncertainty here. There’s a real tension between wanting to get it “right” and letting the hand wander, allowing the lines to find their own way across the page. See the different types of marks and how they feel? It is a real conversation. I wonder if Gerhard thought that she got the details right. I wonder what she would think of it now. That dance between intention and accident, control and surrender, is what makes drawing so alive. It reminds me of how much we, as artists, owe to the past, to all those who’ve picked up a pencil and tried to capture the world, one fragile line at a time.