Untitled c. 1939 - 1940

This untitled drawing by Jackson Pollock is a sheet filled with figural forms in graphite and colored pencil. I can imagine him in his studio, maybe restless, feeling a need to get some ideas down. The overall effect is one of contained energy, like a bunch of little thoughts let loose on the page. Look at the way one form leads to another, how some are more defined, colored in, while others are just wisps. There is an animal-like figure in the lower center, crouching, with these beautiful, sinuous lines of color wrapping around its limbs. Then, at the top, there's almost a mask or a head with these spiky, radiating lines. I think of Cy Twombly when I see this, who was also obsessed with mark-making, but Pollock seems to be searching for something different, maybe a figure, maybe a feeling, that is primal and a little scary. It reminds me that artists are always in conversation, borrowing, responding, and pushing each other. The act of drawing is like a dance of the hand and mind, a record of an artist thinking and feeling.