#frankauerbach

For this series of large-scale charcoal portraits made between 1956 and 1962, the German-British painter Frank Auerbach drew his sitters over and over again, erasing the image after each session so that only a ghostly outline remained. He repeated the process until he felt he had captured the person’s essence; often the paper would rip. “What is so captivating about the drawings is how Auerbach could elicit such complex responses using just a piece of charcoal and a stick of chalk,” says curator Barnaby Wright, who has brought the portraits together for the first time for an exhibition. “We are so saturated by superficial images of people that these drawings offer us an enriching alternative, something deeply human and full of vitality.”

Lucian Freud, Frank Auerbach, 1981, MoMA: Drawings and Prints

Gift of Dorothy Braude Edinburg in honor of Eleanor Sayre Size: plate: 6 x 5 7/16" (15.2 x 13.8cm); sheet: 15 13/16 x 13 3/16" (40.1 x 33.5cm) Medium: Etching and aquatint

Reclining Head of Julia, Frank Auerbach, 2003, MoMA: Drawings and Prints

The Judith Rothschild Foundation Contemporary Drawings Collection Gift Size: 22 1/2 x 30 1/4" (57.2 x 76.8 cm) Medium: Pencil on paper

Ruth I, Frank Auerbach, (1994), MoMA: Drawings and Prints

Johanna and Leslie J. Garfield Fund Size: plate: 9 15/16 x 8 1/16" (25.3 x 20.4 cm); sheet: 14 15/16 x 12 5/8" (38 x 32 cm) Medium: Etching and aquatint