Reading in traditional costume 1944

Jozef Hanula made this pastel drawing of a woman in traditional dress reading in 1944. The soft, almost smudged quality of the pastel gives the whole piece a dreamy, introspective mood, like a memory or a quiet thought. I love the way Hanula uses color here. It's not about bold contrasts, but more about subtle shifts in tone. The skin tones are built up with layers of peach, grey, and brown, creating a soft, almost luminous effect. Look at the scarf around her neck, the way he's hinted at the pattern with these tiny flicks of green and gold. It's like he's trying to capture the essence of the fabric without getting too bogged down in details. It reminds me a little of Vuillard, that same sense of intimacy and quiet observation. But there's also something uniquely Hanula about it, a kind of gentle reverence for his subject. It feels less like a portrait and more like a meditation on the act of reading itself, a moment of quiet contemplation in a world that's always trying to distract us.