Untitled [woman leaning back on sofa] 1955 - 1967

This is an undated drawing of a woman leaning back on a sofa, made by Richard Diebenkorn using graphite on paper. I wonder about the woman. The rapid, searching marks of graphite suggest Diebenkorn was trying to find her, trying to understand her pose, but also her mood. Is she relaxing, or just exhausted? The marks around her face are darker, thicker, suggesting a kind of melancholy. The pillow behind her head is scribbled into existence, a jumble of lines, while the rest of her body is rendered with a lighter touch. Maybe Diebenkorn was thinking about Matisse, about his odalisques, but stripping away all the color and leaving only the bare bones of the pose. Or maybe he was just trying to capture a fleeting moment, a glimpse of someone caught in a private reverie. Either way, it feels like a conversation between artists across time, each one borrowing and transforming what came before.