Self-Portrait 1973

This self-portrait by Sam Francis is made with simple, unadorned lines, probably with crayon or charcoal on paper. It’s all about the process of seeing, a way to capture not just what’s there, but the feeling of being seen. The texture of the strokes is so raw, you can almost feel the artist’s hand moving across the page. The lines around the eyes are particularly interesting: they’re shaky, uneven, yet they manage to convey such expressiveness. You can see how he keeps adjusting the marks to describe that complex shape. It's this layering that brings the portrait to life, inviting us to look closer, maybe even to recognize a bit of ourselves. Francis often played with the idea of the unfinished, the incomplete. It reminds me a little bit of Cy Twombly's work, where the act of making is just as important as the final image. It’s a reminder that art is not about perfection, but about the messy, beautiful process of trying to understand ourselves and the world.