The Gift of Drawing: Cy Twombly at Menil Drawing Institute

The Menil Drawing Institute in Houston presents 'The Gift of Drawing: Cy Twombly,' an exhibition of 27 works donated by the Cy Twombly Foundation in 2025. The show, on view through August 9, 2026, explores Twombly's 'Blind Drawing' technique developed in 1954 while he served as a cryptologist in Augusta, Georgia. Drawing in the dark, he encrypted his hand, producing cryptic, insect-like forms. The exhibition traces his evolution from graphite works to the colorful, smudged paintings of his Italian period, culminating in the ten-part 'Scent of Madness' (1986). Twombly's practice blurs drawing, writing, and painting, a concept echoed by Roland Barthes' term 'calligraphy.' The Menil, which houses the largest public collection of Twombly's work, presents the show separately from its permanent Cy Twombly Gallery.