Sculptuur van een naakte jongen 1696

Hendrick van Beaumont made this drawing of a nude boy using reddish-brown chalk on paper. Chalk is interesting - it's so immediate, allowing the artist to build up tone and texture very quickly. You can almost see Beaumont's hand moving across the page. The drawing depicts a sculpture of a young boy, positioned on a rough plinth, likely from antiquity. Chalk allows for nuanced shading, giving form and depth to the figure. The artist captures the softness of the boy's flesh, and the rough texture of the base. But beyond mere representation, the drawing is a fascinating record of the artist’s thought process. The way Beaumont has used chalk, layering strokes to define contours and model form, underscores the link between drawing and sculpture – two practices of modeling in tone and volume. This prompts us to consider art not just as image, but as a record of creative labor, blurring the lines between media and disciplines.