An extraordinary and entirely unprecedented composition — a large horizontal ink drawing of extreme close-up: a face pressed against a pillow, the composition reduced to the large curved form of the head/pillow from above and the face emerging from the side, barely visible between the rounded masses. This is not a portrait study but a study of intimacy and vulnerability: a person asleep or resting, their face compressed between two soft surfaces.
The bold ink marks describe two major forms: the large curved back-of-head form at the top, rendered with a single heavy outer contour and interior marks suggesting the skull beneath; and the pillow mass at lower right, its soft rounded form described in a separate curved contour. Between these two large forms, the face barely appears — the eye with its lashes barely visible, the brow above it, the lower features compressed and private.
A small Y-shaped mark at the crown of the head — a glimpse of a hair part or a whorl — is the most intimate detail: the back of a head at the place where the hair divides.
This composition bears no relationship to the portrait tradition that makes up most of the face studies in the collection. It is not about seeing a face — it is about a face at its most private, when it is not performing for the world. The ink technique, bold and rapid, suits the subject: this was drawn quickly, from close observation of someone not posing.