Description

This rare unique drawing by Arnold Gross, best known for his richly detailed and colorful etchings, reveals the immediacy and charm of his hand-drawn imagination. Don Quixote stands among the few independent works on paper in his oeuvre, offering a direct glimpse into the artist’s lyrical and humorous worldview.

Executed in brisk, fluid ink lines, Gross presents Don Quixote as a gentle dreamer, mounted on his horse and facing a nude woman holding flowers—an emblem of pure, idealized beauty. Around them, a cat, birds, and a smiling sun populate the scene, infusing it with the artist’s characteristic warmth and playful symbolism.

Despite its simplicity, the composition is layered with meaning: Quixote embodies the artist’s own lifelong themes of imagination, innocence, and the quiet persistence of hope. The work’s childlike spontaneity conceals a sophisticated balance between irony and tenderness—a hallmark of Gross’s visual poetry.

As a unique work on paper, Don Quixote occupies a special place in Arnold Gross’s legacy, standing as both a personal meditation on artistic idealism and a celebration of his singular, dreamlike universe.

Details