Miriam Cahn’s works on paper, in which she uses either charcoal or colored chalk, often seem to have been made in great haste. Her fleeting gestures suggest an effort to give form to thoughts and emotions in as direct a manner as possible, and the almost unbearable urgency of the images that appear point to a restless, doubt-ridden artistic practice.

The large works in charcoal generally involve Cahn’s whole body. Only by kneeling on the sheets of drawing paper can the entire surface be worked; as a result, she leave traces of her hands, arms, and legs. Cahn’s process has been compared to Pollock’s