Street in London 1915

Mstislav Dobuzhinsky made this drawing, Street in London, with pencil, in no specific year. Look at how the marks build up, creating depth, how there is an iterative rhythm going on, a push and pull. The texture of the paper is crucial here; you can feel the tooth of it, how it grabs the graphite. See how the artist uses hatching to build up the shadows, those tiny parallel lines that give the whole image a kind of vibrating energy. It's not just about depicting a scene; it’s about the act of drawing itself. The surface almost becomes alive, like it's breathing. I keep coming back to the way the grid of the bridge relates to the geometry of the buildings, it's like Mondrian meets Fritz Lang, but the whole scene is enveloped in a smoky, dreamlike atmosphere. This piece reminds me a little of Piranesi, the way he used architecture to create these vast, almost claustrophobic spaces. It’s the conversation that keeps on going.