Untitled (Abstract) 1937

Ray Kaiser made this abstract work with ink on paper. Look at the range of marks, from the hatched textures to the heavy outlines. It’s like she's thinking out loud, the marks building up, one on top of the other, searching for a form. I can imagine Kaiser experimenting, letting her hand move freely, almost like doodling, but with a real intensity. She's probably looking at other artists, maybe some Surrealists with their automatist gestures, or the way Picasso scrambled up the figure. You can see the influence, but she's not just copying. That one looping line there, like a dark umbilical cord, anchors everything. It gives the composition a weight and a rhythm, tying all these disparate shapes together. It’s kind of like a feeling, raw and exposed. It's like she’s telling a story without using words, just shapes and textures, full of ambiguity. And that's what makes painting so interesting, isn't it? It’s never just one thing.