Moshe Dayan, Minister of Defense 1973

Oskar Kokoschka made this portrait of Moshe Dayan, the Minister of Defense, with what looks like charcoal on paper. The marks are so alive, like a seismograph reading the energy of the subject. The texture is all in the layering of these quick, almost frantic lines. There's a real tension between the blank paper and the dense hatching that forms Dayan's face and figure. It's like Kokoschka is wrestling with the essence of his subject, not just describing what he sees, but feeling the weight of the person in front of him. The eye patch is particularly interesting. It's scribbled in a way that both obscures and emphasizes, adding to the sense of a man marked by history. Kokoschka’s raw approach reminds me of Egon Schiele, another Austrian Expressionist. Both artists embrace ambiguity, inviting us to see the world not as fixed, but as a constant process of becoming.