Studies of male heads and a standing male figure 

Curator: Here we have Eugène Delacroix’s “Studies of Male Heads and a Standing Male Figure,” rendered in watercolor and colored pencil. It has a really ephemeral quality, wouldn't you agree? Editor: Absolutely. My first impression is of faces emerging from mist, or maybe figures fading from memory. They all seem rather preoccupied. It feels like peeking into someone else's dream journal. Curator: Dreams, indeed. Delacroix was intensely interested in the theater, literature, history; his process involved constant sketching and re-sketching of the figures that haunted his imagination. We see glimpses of these emerging characters here. I wonder if you can pick up any familiar sartorial choices from that era? Editor: The man in the top hat certainly catches my eye; it's like an echo of the rising bourgeoisie of the 19th century. There is also a figure wearing a turban. The entire assortment invokes something about a theater production, like it contains references and memories for one yet to be held stage performance, or past scenes. Curator: His fascination with the exotic—North Africa especially—often bled into his art, his interpretation being rather romantic, wouldn't you say? That figure may symbolize those themes he would revisit over and over. The very fluidity of the watercolor technique here makes the people dissolve as though they are characters whose destinies he is unable to shape in solidity. Editor: Yes, a visual metaphor perhaps. The use of watercolor is incredibly effective, like memories almost dissolving away, always slipping from our grasp just when we think we have understood them completely. Water symbolizes the unconscious and what hides inside us - hidden emotions, traumas. Delacroix, like an icon painter of his time, captures not the true resemblance, but reveals hidden emotions. Curator: Delacroix said, "What moves men of genius, or rather what inspires their work, is not new ideas, but their obsession with the idea that what has already been said is still not enough." This, I think, is very indicative of the sketches present here. Editor: It reminds us that symbols and archetypes resonate across time, re-emerging, recast, in different forms; Delacroix seemed to have grasped that implicitly. His studies go deeper than the mere outlines on paper; the technique elevates the image to the point where he paints straight to the unconscious mind. Curator: Very well said! What started as possibly sketches and notes now represents a study of human nature. Thank you, it's been insightful.