Leonora Portnoff 1935

Curator: Here we have Arshile Gorky’s portrait of “Leonora Portnoff,” a graphite and pencil drawing from 1935. Editor: Her eyes… They’re wide and almost unnervingly direct. I feel as though she's looking right through me, a vulnerable yet strong gaze that makes me wonder about her story. It’s so immediate, despite the subtle softness of the pencil work. Curator: Absolutely. What's interesting to me is the process of translating an image, a person into graphite and pencil, transforming material reality. The labor and material constraints shape our interpretation. We need to think about how mass production and consumption shape how the labor is divided. Editor: I suppose so, though what truly enthralls me is this very imperfectness—the smudges and the visible lines. This lends a feeling of immediacy, doesn’t it? I sense both the artist's hand and Leonora's living, breathing presence, almost caught in a transient moment of intimacy and fragility. It’s as though, just then, Arshile caught something of her inner life with each stroke. Curator: Of course, you get all of that through pencil on paper! Consider where the paper came from, the specific pencils selected, and how the social status and power dynamics of both the subject and the artist shaped the drawing. We see what the division of labor and available materials make manifest. Editor: See, my focus isn't necessarily on the paper source. My attention goes to the tension in those eyes of hers. And what appears, at first glance, like tenderness reveals a sense of unease too. Does this have to do with art history, the constraints placed upon its creators? Or does Gorky capture something intrinsically raw and real about her? Maybe a shared immigrant anxiety? Curator: Immigrant anxiety is important to recognize as an element. But, ultimately, isn’t everything? And don’t we miss other anxieties and even modes of pleasure in our own time if we fetishize the individual experience at the expense of the structures that are at play? Editor: That’s possible. Ultimately, to look at it from both perspectives gives an expansive understanding. Curator: Agreed. I learned much from hearing you today! Editor: Same here. A fresh look always reveals something more, doesn't it?