The Pitcher 1978

LeRoy Neiman made this drawing, ‘The Pitcher,’ with crayon, pastel and pencil. Just imagine those marks being made, layering one on top of the other: blues and yellows like a summer day in the sun. You can see how the composition has come into being, shifting and emerging through layering, erasure, and intuition. I sympathize with Neiman, imagining what it must have been like to create. What he might have been thinking when he made it? It's interesting to see how he used the side of the crayon, dragging it across the surface to describe the contours of the pitcher’s form. It makes the image look smudgy and vague, but that's kind of the point. Neiman was an artist who loved to depict action, sport, and movement. There's a way in which the looseness of this drawing embodies that ethos; he’s capturing a moment in time, a gesture. And for me, that simple gesture communicates feeling, intention, and meaning. Artists are in an ongoing conversation and exchange of ideas across time, inspiring one another’s creativity. For me, painting is a form of embodied expression which embraces ambiguity and uncertainty, allowing for multiple interpretations.