Hannah Motzel Brown’s shadowy mechanical pencil drawings expertly depict fingers, freckles and folds of skin

Hannah Motzel Brown wants more skin. Through her evocative graphite drawings on paper, she shows skin – her own, other’s, our’s – and finds a place for it in a space between fantasy and reality “to explore the feminine: the woman in her space, and the environment and objects that surround her,” the artist tells It’s Nice That. The way she substitutes the spectrums of colour on our skin (freckles, scars, scratches, blushes, veins, blood rising to the skin) and places it in the realm of shadows is a perfect match for mechanical pencils. Shadows create depth to chests, bellies, folds of skin and especially fingers, where the creases around our joints catch and reject light, just like how the dresses her subjects wear can crease and crush. Bodies look infinitely foldable, capable of extension and detraction, sometimes her figures flood the frame of her drawings, other times they’re engulfed in shadowy environments. Nudity, in Hannah’s drawings, is natural, private and careful. Always occurring.

“The process of building up an image in mechanical pencil involves working slowly from hard to soft lead, in order to create depth and softness in the image. Though the drawings are highly detailed and based in reality, there is a crudeness to the depiction of depth and space,” says Hannah, who finds inspiration in Euan Uglow, Lauren Dela Roche and, of course, Tom of Finland. Skin is juxtaposed with flower petals, whispery curtains or precious materials – the threat of harmability is as soft as the pencil strokes, which makes the carefulness of each drawing so deeply felt. The cartoon element – textured with realistic styles – is wonderful, and it allows for interesting experimentations in how the human eye registers the body. Sometimes it’s remixed through near Cubist vibes and other times fascinated by depth manipulation. “I find that the space between fantasy and realism is a perfect area to explore the feminine,” says Hannah. “The woman in her space, and the environment and objects that surround her.”