Untitled [female nude crouching] 1955 - 1967

Richard Diebenkorn made this drawing of a female nude using ink on paper, and you can see the hand moving, can't you? I like to imagine him working quickly, trying to capture the essence of the figure with as few lines as possible. There's a real sense of spontaneity here, like he's letting the ink flow and just seeing what happens. I wonder what he was thinking about as he drew this woman? Was he thinking about the old masters, like Matisse or Picasso, who also drew nudes? The ink is thin, but the line is bold and confident. The splatters add a sense of energy and movement. It's like he's not just drawing a body, he's drawing the feeling of being in a body. This reminds me of other drawings and paintings by Diebenkorn and other expressionists, like de Kooning, who are interested in the relationship between the figure and the ground. Artists are in an ongoing conversation, aren’t they? Thinking and challenging each other across time. Painting is embodied, not fixed.