Seated Female Nude 1875 - 1934

This drawing of a seated female nude was made by Isaac Israels. It’s all soft pencil lines on paper, almost like a whisper. I can imagine Israels rapidly capturing the pose, those marks darting and searching, trying to pin down the essence of the figure. It’s not about perfection. I bet he was trying to understand the model’s form, its energy and weight. Look at the positioning of the legs and the tonal shading in the hair. You get this sense of movement, a moment caught in time. The quick, searching marks are a language all their own, they remind me of Degas’ drawings. It makes you think about the artist's eye, trying to find its way around a subject, the history of seeing, and the exchange of ideas between artists. Each one just riffing off the other. It reminds me that making art is a conversation with others.