Access a slow-looking exercise related to this work.

Transcript
Marilee Talkington: This small drawing by Pablo Picasso, titled Absinthe Drinker, measures about five inches high by eight inches wide. The work was made around 1901 with black and orangish-red crayons on cream-colored paper.

Loose dark outlines indicate a round table with a tall carafe on the lower-right side of the composition. On the left, a feminine-presenting figure leans on the table with a bent elbow, head tilted slightly with their hand placed on their chin. The figure faces us, the viewers, with a slight smile. The only noted facial features are three precise black lines, marking the smile and two closed, or perhaps thickly lashed, eyes. A swirl of dark lines form the figure’s tall, brimmed hat, topped with accents of additional feathery lines. Framing the face are dark bangs and hair piled thickly and pinned up under the hat.

The figure’s coat is outlined in a series of loose, dark lines that emphasize the shoulders and flow down through the figure’s arms. The lines extending down the left sleeve spill along the bottom-left corner of the drawing and curl, building a loose outline of a hand. Inside the outlines, a series of orangish-red vertical lines fill out the figure’s coat.

In the top-right corner, the cursive signature, “Picasso,” is underlined.

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