Mouse c. 1937

Giacinto Capelli made this drawing of a Mouse with pencil on paper. Look at how Capelli used shading and highlights to give the mouse a sense of form. It's as if he's feeling his way around the object with the pencil, mapping its contours and volumes. I can see the process of artmaking laid bare in the soft gradients and the almost imperceptible shifts in tone. The mouse sits, an ethereal body hovering just above the paper, its spindly legs frozen mid-stride. The stark simplicity reminds me of the drawings of Agnes Martin. But where Martin's lines are precise and geometric, Capelli’s are soft, almost tentative. This mouse seems to exist in a liminal space, a world of dreams, a whispered echo in the silence. Ultimately, the beauty of art lies in its ability to embrace ambiguity and to invite multiple interpretations.