Bill Jensen
Drawing for Legion1983–84
charcoal
21 3/4 x 18 in.
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase made possible by J.R. Hodge, The National Institute Gift, B.C. Reynolds, S.I. Transfers and Catherine Wiley
Bill Jensen's drawings, watercolors, and paintings combine an intimacy of scale with an intensity of expression. His dense, compact, and heavily worked forms strain the boundaries of his composition with an energy generated from within. In Drawing for Legion, religious and sexual allusions, such as the trumpet-like forms and phallic shapes, suggest both physical and spiritual redemption on the Day of Judgment.
