Untitled [seated female nude leaning into a chair] 1955 - 1967

Richard Diebenkorn made this 'Untitled [seated female nude leaning into a chair]' on paper with ink, and it's all about how he used the ink to explore form. The ink is really fluid, almost like water, which gives the whole image a sense of movement. It's not about capturing every detail, but about capturing the essence of the figure. Notice how some areas are dark and dense, while others are light and transparent, like the sweep of ink that defines her spine. It reminds me of Helen Frankenthaler's soak-stain paintings, where the paint becomes one with the canvas, but here, the ink is defining the negative space around the figure. Diebenkorn was always playing with the push and pull between abstraction and representation, and this piece shows that tension beautifully. It's like he's saying, "I'm not just drawing what I see, but also what I feel." And that's what makes it so engaging.