Seated Woman Holding Head in Hand (Femme nueassise, la tete appuyee sur la main) 1934

This etching of a seated woman holding her head, was done by Pablo Picasso and it is mostly lines on a white background. It's a study in simplicity. Just look at how Picasso distills the figure down to the barest of lines, each one placed with such precision, yet the overall effect feels so spontaneous. The textures are soft, created with subtle scratching in the plate. It feels like the process of thought, where an idea is roughly sketched then reworked and refined. It's as if he's thinking out loud, each line a question, a possibility. And then there's that face. The way it's both there and not there, like a memory or a dream. That’s what makes this work so compelling - it's not about capturing a likeness, it's about capturing a feeling. For me, Picasso has the same sort of energy as Guston. The ghost of a thought, not quite formed.