Schets voor een portret van een jonge vrouw 1910

Thérèse Schwartze made this drawing of a young woman with a stick of graphite, we don't know when, exactly. Look at the network of delicate lines, barely there, they build the impression of a figure emerging, ghostlike, from the paper's surface. Schwartze coaxes the image into being, a tender process of seeking and finding. I imagine she had to make a ton of decisions of where to put the weight and where to leave blank space. What was she searching for? What was she thinking as she made it? There's a palpable sense of care and attention in the drawing, but also of uncertainty and doubt. Did she leave the face blank on purpose, or did she run out of time? Maybe she was looking at other painters like Whistler and Manet, who left so much open for interpretation? Artists are in an ongoing conversation across time, inspiring one another's creativity.