A piece of paper is fixed to a base with drawing pins. A right hand is busy sketching a shirt-cuff upon this drawing paper. At this point its work is incomplete, but a little further to the right it has already drawn a left hand emerging from a sleeve in such detail that this hand has come right up out of the flat surface, and in its turn it is sketching the cuff from which the right hand is emerging, as though it were a living member.

Drawing Hands is one of Escher's most recognized prints, although most people who are asked cannot name the artist. As the print Reptiles also exhibits, Drawing Hands, is a conflict between the flat surface and spatial perception. No artist before or after Escher has been able to turn flat surfaces (drawings) into such spatial perplexities.