View from Wordens Hill 1943

Milton Avery made this sketch of the "View from Wordens Hill" with pencil on paper. It's a drawing that feels immediate, like it was made right there, on the spot. You know, just looking at it you can tell Avery wasn't fussing over details. Instead, there's a real looseness, a focus on capturing the essence of the landscape. The marks are light and quick, with the bare minimum of information used to capture the overall scene. Look at the mountains in the background, which are suggested with just a few sketchy lines. Then check out how the foliage in the foreground is depicted using all these scribbled marks. You can almost feel Avery’s hand moving across the paper, responding to the world around him. It’s a reminder that artmaking is a process of discovery, of seeing and feeling, and then translating that into marks on a surface. I'm reminded of drawings by Guston, who also relished the beauty of simple, direct mark-making.