Untitled [front view of a standing female nude] 1955 - 1967

This is a standing female nude drawn by Richard Diebenkorn, but when? The date's not listed, so let’s just imagine him working on it. The drawing is made of thin, black lines on a pale paper surface, almost as if it were effortlessly composed. But I bet it wasn't, not really. Think about the kind of focus needed to distill a body down to its barest essence. There's a raw immediacy to the piece, each line capturing a contour, a shadow, a fleeting expression. The lines are confident, but sometimes they flicker or stutter. I wonder, was Diebenkorn trying to find the simplest way to communicate the body's volume, or was he thinking more abstractly, exploring the tension between line and form? The influence of artists like Matisse comes to mind. They’re all in conversation, right? Each artist builds upon the discoveries of those who came before, pushing the boundaries of mark-making. It's a kind of dance across time, a visual call-and-response, exploring the endless possibilities of painting.