Entwurf für ein Triptychon (Sketch for a Tryptich) [p. 4] 

This page is a sketch for a triptych, made by Max Beckmann sometime in the first half of the 20th century. It is rendered in pencil on notebook paper. While we might think of drawing as an inherently free activity, even the most seemingly straightforward sketch is deeply embedded in processes of production. Take the paper: a mass-produced object, which only became cheap and readily available in the 19th century. And consider the pencil, with its graphite core—mined from the earth, processed, and encased in wood. Beckmann has used these materials in a very straightforward way, quickly laying out the composition for a more elaborate artwork. The notebook paper has lines, suggesting it was literally a support for writing. So this is the most provisional kind of drawing, the kind we all might do. Thinking about this artwork in terms of its materials and means of production prompts us to see the web of connections, social and economic, that undergird all creative activity. Even an artist’s initial sketch.