Zwei Männer (Two Men) [p. 50] 1927

This pencil sketch of two men is by Max Beckmann. The lines feel raw and immediate, like he's capturing a fleeting moment, or perhaps wrestling with an idea. I love how Beckmann lets the lines be tentative, almost searching, as if he's thinking through the act of drawing. You can see the ghost of previous marks, decisions he’s changed his mind about - I do that too. I wonder what he was thinking, what kind of relationship he was imagining between the two figures, caught in this kind of in-between moment. They look like they could be in the middle of a heavy conversation, a disagreement maybe? Beckmann’s sketches often feel like a peek into his thought process; you can see a lot of the same intensity in his paintings, but here, it's distilled to its essence. It reminds me that making art is about working through something, rather than figuring it out in advance. He lets us see the messy, vulnerable side of creativity. We’re all in conversation with one another, all the time.