Portrait 1962

This portrait was made in ink by Hryhorii Havrylenko, we're not sure exactly when. You know, with ink, it’s all about the relationship between control and letting go, isn’t it? There’s a dance between what you intend and what the medium decides to do. Look at the way the ink pools and bleeds around her hair, almost like a halo of shadow. And then see how those washes of grey define the planes of her face. The artist has captured her likeness with such economy of means! It makes me think about how much we can say with so little. The little blue mark under the eye is interesting. Is it a tear, or is it a way for the artist to leave his mark, like a painterly signature? It feels kind of vulnerable, the way it runs. What I love about this work is how it embraces imperfection. Like a Cy Twombly drawing, it knows that beauty lies in the flawed, the unfinished, the maybe-not-quite-right.