Selällään oleva alaston mies, luonnos 1913 - 1915

Magnus Enckell made this sketch of a reclining nude male, probably around the turn of the last century, using pencil on paper. It's so raw, just a flurry of marks, you can really feel him working through the angles of the body, trying to nail down the form. It's a kind of beautiful mess. Look at the hatching around the right side of the figure - it's almost like he's trying to erase the body into the background, or maybe bring the background forward. The way he renders light and shadow is so interesting, not trying to fool you into thinking it's real, but using it to create a kind of emotional space. Enckell's work often has this kind of quiet intensity. You see a similar approach in the drawings of someone like Marsden Hartley - that direct, unfussy engagement with the figure, a real love for the physicality of the body, but also the beauty of a simple mark on paper. Ultimately, art is all about conversation between artists, across time and space.