Mandril 1908 - 1909

Edvard Munch made this drawing of a Mandril sometime in his career using what looks like charcoal on paper. The paper is raw and the marks are quickly made, like he’s trying to capture something fleeting. There's a directness to the line – it’s all about the gesture, the feeling of the thing rather than precise detail. I like how the marks build up to create the form, there is a real sense of the physicality of the charcoal, you can imagine him holding the stick and moving it across the page. Look at the way the charcoal smudges and blends, especially around the face – it gives the monkey a kind of hazy, dreamlike quality. You can see this same kind of mark making and emotional rawness in other artists like Käthe Kollwitz. Ultimately, this drawing feels like a glimpse into Munch’s mind, a raw and unfiltered expression of his inner world.