Resting boy

Rudolf Gudden made this light, sensitive pencil sketch, called "Resting Boy", at an unknown date. Look at the surface of the paper; you can see the subtle texture and the way the pencil lines respond to it. Gudden isn't trying to hide his process. Instead, he's letting the marks be visible, like a kind of visual thinking. It’s like he is working something out. The whole composition hangs on this lovely fluid line that defines the curve of the boy's back. There's a beautiful tension between the soft modeling of the figure and the more abstract rendering of the setting. Gudden reminds me a bit of artists like Paula Modersohn-Becker, who were also exploring new ways of representing the human form with a sense of immediacy. It all feels so open-ended, as if inviting us to participate in the act of seeing.