Jay DeFeo

The Eyes
1958

Detailed sketch of two human eyes with vertical distortion lines running through them.

One of several works in which Jay DeFeo addresses the act of seeing, either through title or subject matter, The Eyes was inspired by a photograph of the artist. DeFeo later spoke of The Eyes as having “something of a prophetic meaning,” a precursor to her envisioning her signature work, The Rose (1958-66). Apart from personal references, DeFeo's ambitious sense of scale, along with the numerous vertical striations and erasures across the disembodied eyes, make this image of a familiar subject arresting and unexpected. DeFeo inscribed the back of this drawing with a stanza from a poem by Beat poet Philip Lamantia: “Tell him I have eyes only for Heaven as I look to you Queen Mirror of the Heavenly Court.”

Not on view

Date
1958

Classification
Drawings

Medium
Graphite pencil on paper

Dimensions
Sheet (Sight): 42 × 84 3/4in. (106.7 × 215.3 cm)

Accession number
96.242.3

Credit line
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of the Lannan Foundation

Rights and reproductions
© The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

API
artworks/11066

Audio

Jay DeFeo, The Eyes, 1958

In Where We Are (Spanish)

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Jay DeFeo, The Eyes, 1958

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Narrator: Cuando DeFeo realizó The Eyes, la artista pensaba en la visión en un sentido profundo y casi profético; imaginó lo que vendría después en su labor como artista. Habló de este dibujo en 1980.
Jay DeFeo: Fue un dibujo muy importante para mí. Fue casi una experiencia visionaria, como si viera de adentro hacia afuera.
Narrator: Leah Levy es directora y co-fiduciaria del Fondo Jay DeFeo en Berkeley, California.
Leah Levy: Este dibujo es de los propios ojos de Jay DeFeo. Está realizado a gran escala y usó una fotografía pequeña de sus ojos como modelo. Las marcas verticales son una especie de entelado o velo. No sabemos con certeza lo que estaba pensando o lo que representan, pero de ser un dibujo realista o casi hiperrealista lo transforman en algo que no solo es más misterioso sino también más visionario, en algo más etéreo.
Jay DeFeo, The Eyes, 1958

In Where We Are (Spanish)

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Jay DeFeo, The Eyes, 1958

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Mark Joshua Epstein: Estamos frente a una obra de Jay DeFeo llamada The Eyes, y me pregunto qué les llama la atención acerca de esta obra de arte.
Estudiante 1: Al verse solo los ojos, es como si se hiciera borroso todo lo demás, incluso todo lo que está cerca de los ojos.
Estudiante 2: Yo me fijé que, en el centro, donde tendría que estar la nariz, solo hay como… Me recuerdan a lonchas.
Estudiante 1: Parece que te estuviera mirando directamente.
Mark Joshua Epstein: Jay DeFeo estaba mirando una fotografía de sus propios ojos, la artista estaba mirando una fotografía de sus propios ojos cuando creó esta obra de arte, y me pregunto: ¿creen que contaría como autorretrato aun cuando solo incluye los ojos?
Estudiante 2: Yo creo que sí porque, aunque no se muestre la cara entera, los ojos transmiten mucho de alguna manera.
Estudiante 1: Quizás esté viendo algo triste, porque a veces se compara la tristeza con algo que se ha rajado o roto, así que podría estar mirando algo triste.
Estudiante 2: Creo que, a veces, una fotografía parece muy real, pero a veces si algo no es muy realista o si es bastante realista pero con un toque diferente te hace pensar más.
Jay DeFeo, The Eyes, 1958

In Where We Are

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Jay DeFeo, The Eyes, 1958

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Mark Joshua Epstein: We’re looking at a piece by Jay DeFeo called The Eyes, and I'm wondering, what do you notice about this art work?
Student 1: To make it just the eyes they kind of blur out everything—like everything even close to the eyes.
Student 2: I noticed that in the middle, like where the nose should be, it’s just kind of like almost, it reminds me of slices almost.
Student 3: It looks like it is just staring right at you.
Mark Joshua Epstein: Jay DeFeo was looking at a photograph of her own eyes—the artist was looking at a photograph of her own eyes when she made this artwork and I'm wondering, do you think it counts as a self-portrait even though it’s just her eyes?
Student 1: I think it does count because even though it doesn’t show your entire whole face, the eyes sort of convey a lot.
Student 2: Maybe she is looking at sadness or something, because sometimes people would compare sadness to something being cracked or broken, so she could be looking at something sad.
Student 3: I think that sometimes like a photograph looks very real, but sometimes if something is not super realistic, or if it’s kind of realistic with a little bit of something like a twist, it gives you more to think about.
Jay DeFeo, The Eyes, 1958

In Where We Are

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Jay DeFeo, The Eyes, 1958

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Narrator: When DeFeo made The Eyes, she was thinking about vision in a deep, almost prophetic sense—imagining what would come next for her as an artist. She spoke about the drawing in 1980.
Jay DeFeo: It was a very important drawing for me to do. It was almost a kind of visionary experience for me, as though I were seeing from the inside out.
Narrator: Leah Levy is Director and Co-Trustee of the Jay DeFeo Trust in Berkeley, California.
Leah Levy: This drawing is of Jay DeFeo's own eyes. It's done at a very large scale, and she used a small photograph of her own eyes as a model for this. The vertical marks are kind of a scrim or a veil. We don't specifically know what she was thinking or what they represent, but they turn it from a realistic or almost super realistic drawing into something that's not only more mysterious, but that's more visionary, that's more otherworldly.