Evil Intentions

Born in Rome to wealthy American parents, Romaine Brooks worked primarily in Paris, where she was a leading member of the city’s artistic counterculture. Although best known for her portraits of notable women in oil, she also executed a large body of graphite drawings, adopting a highly personal style informed by the visionary forms of Symbolism, the sinuous lines of Art Nouveau, and the automatic drawing practices of Surrealism. Brooks began working in graphite in Paris in 1930, after a leg injury left her bedridden. Initially, she planned to publish her drawings as illustrations in her autobiography No Pleasant Memories, but she eventually went on to create drawings for their own sake. Featuring shrouded figures and imaginary animals engaged in ominous behavior, these works can be viewed as a form of self-portraiture illustrating unsettling memories from the artist’s troubled childhood.