Study for or after Legs of a Walking Ball 1965

Eva Hesse made this study with ink and watercolor, and it’s like a peek into a playful construction site. Looking at this, I imagine Hesse bent over the paper, the fine lines coming into being through trial, error, and intuition. There’s this big, bulbous shape filled with tight brown lines – it’s almost like the whole drawing is squeezing it, pushing it around. I can almost feel the texture of the paper, how the ink bleeds just a tiny bit into the fibers, and how the watercolor pools in certain spots. The colors make me think of a gloomy day in the city, and that one little splash of yellow feels so optimistic. It is as if the whole thing is a big experiment, which is what drawing is for! It reminds me of the work of Philip Guston, especially in its awkwardness and vulnerability. They're all just trying to figure out how to build this weird thing together, and it might be beautiful or it might be a disaster, who knows?