Portret van een onbekende man 1921 - 1922

Isaac Israels made this portrait of an unknown man in an unknown year with what looks like a graphite pencil. You can see how the artist began, shifted, and adjusted the lines as he drew. I wonder what Israels was thinking when he made this work. It looks like he was searching for something, trying to capture something in the person's expression. Look at how Israels uses such economy of line to describe the cloth wrapped around the sitter's head. The lines around the body are more tentative and loose, as if still in the process of becoming. That one continuous line from the top of the head down to the shoulder communicates so much feeling and intention; it gives me an opening to imagine what it might have been like to be in the same room while Israels made the drawing. This feels like a quick sketch, like something glimpsed, an ongoing exchange of ideas across time, inspiring a conversation between artists that stretches from the past to the present.