Crosshatch 1989

This is an artwork by Jasper Johns called "Crosshatch." Look at those marks! You can imagine him, maybe in his studio, layering those crisscrossing lines, each one a decision, a correction, a step forward. It’s like he’s building something, brick by brick, but with lines. I wonder what he was thinking about when he made this? Was he trying to break something down, or build it up? I feel like I can sense him puzzling over something as he was making this. There's something almost scientific about it, but also deeply felt. Think of the quiet intensity of his studio practice—that constant back-and-forth between seeing and thinking, doing and undoing. Johns's paintings remind us that everything is connected. It’s a dance between control and chaos, intention and accident, that makes art so endlessly fascinating.