Christ Church, St. Louis 1919

Joseph Pennell made this drawing of Christ Church, St. Louis with what looks like graphite on paper, giving it a sort of hazy, dreamlike quality. Looking at this, I think of him standing there, maybe on a cold day, squinting through the fog, trying to capture the feeling of this place. The whole drawing seems to emerge from a kind of gray mist, with the church tower looming like a ghostly figure. The way he uses the graphite – smudging it here, pressing harder there – it's almost like he’s sculpting the image out of the fog itself. It reminds me a little bit of Whistler and those tonalist painters, obsessed with atmosphere and mood. There is a train track going into the distance which gives the image depth and scale, it is like the church is both there and not there. It makes me think about how artists are always in conversation, picking up ideas, and pushing them in new directions. And how a simple drawing can be so full of feeling, capturing a moment, a place, a whole mood.