SUNRISE

The artist has requested a critique?! 'pon my word, it fascinates me when the artist invites criticism of a flawless piece...but this drawing intrigues me with its resonant beauty and so I find I have something to say.
The viewer's eye is introduced to the piece by the sphere of emptiness created by the subject's gnarly hands. Right off I'm engaged. The hands are weathered, coarse and thick-fingered in contrast with the settled simple grace of the hollow. That emptiness is nearly and oddly hypnotic, but its hold is gentle. Curiosity impels the gaze to drift, and mine does so in ripples, moving to the foot and the toe to one knee then across to the other, where it rests like a sparrow on that patient circle of light. A moment to reflect, to acknowledge the title, then another to savor the understated details of bracelets and ring, the seam of the wrist, the puckered denim shirt, the technical beauty of the piece before the return home to the graceful egg-shaped sphere.

A particularly intimate portrait that depicts no visage, instead it is a drawing that creates what it depicts, a mind at rest.