Untitled [seated female nude with right arm draped] 1955 - 1967

Curator: Richard Diebenkorn's "Untitled [seated female nude with right arm draped]," created sometime between 1955 and 1967, presents us with a seemingly simple ink drawing. Editor: It feels so immediate. The line is stark, almost raw. There’s a quiet vulnerability, wouldn't you say, in the way the figure sprawls, filling up this ambiguous space? Curator: I think we have to remember Diebenkorn was deeply engaged with abstract expressionism. So, this isn't just a nude study; it’s a meditation on form and identity, particularly concerning the female figure within a male-dominated art historical canon. The lack of facial features becomes a point of erasure, and simultaneously of universalization. Editor: Yes, but the lines themselves carry a tremendous amount of information. The almost frenetic scribbling in areas hints at musculature and volume, despite the sparseness of the overall drawing. Note the economy of line that creates an entire impression of a body reclining. The artist brilliantly understands the relationship between the positive and negative space within the composition. Curator: I'm intrigued by that sparseness, that "lack," if you will. I wonder if Diebenkorn intended this ambiguity as a statement about the objectification of women and the way that portraiture, throughout the history of Western art, can deny agency? And given the timeframe when this work was created, in what way could the artist possibly have meant for it to stand as an early commentary on the female gaze? Editor: It also serves a purely aesthetic function, stripping away extraneous detail and leading the eye through the shapes themselves— the elegant curve of the spine in direct juxtaposition with the geometric block of the torso. Curator: It pushes us to ask: who is this woman, or better, *who could she be?* That lack of specificity opens up space for reflection on lived experience, the diversity of female form. Editor: I see it as a remarkable demonstration of the power of suggestion. Even in its incomplete state, this sketch has tremendous impact. Curator: Indeed, looking through a gendered lens opens our minds to seeing new layers in this work. Editor: For me, its mastery is the artist's distilled technique: line, form, balance—elements artfully coalescing to evoke profound emotion.