Melancholie I c. 1933

Karl Wiener made this drawing, Melancholie I, using thin, dark lines on a light background. The effect is spare, minimal, like a thought barely captured. I can imagine him, the artist, hunched over this piece of paper, trying to get a feeling out. See how the lines intersect and overlap, forming planes and angles that suggest a face? It’s like he’s building a mask, or maybe deconstructing one. Those lines across the eyes—are they closed in sadness, or are they shutting something out? The long strokes that indicate hair seem almost like tears. I think he must have been trying to capture the elusive, slippery feeling of melancholy. What’s interesting is how those sharp, angular lines don’t resolve into a soft, flowing form but instead keep the feeling raw and unresolved. It's a face but it's also a kind of cage. Wiener’s work reminds me that artists have always been in conversation with each other across time, trying to show us something about what it means to be human. And maybe, most importantly, inspiring us to feel something.