This self-portrait resembles a loose and unfinished sketch with its light shading and charcoal marks.

Perhaps the start to a painting that was never realized, or a study in self-portraiture, what is so intriguing about this drawing is the continuous red line that moves its way down the left side of Beauford’s face. The only facial feature highlighted by the red pastel is his eye.

Beauford’s eyes seem to be a prominent aspect in every one of his self-portraits. In this one, the red gives the impression that tears of blood are seeping from his left eye, bleeding down onto his cheek. He looks distrustfully off into the distance, as if witnessing something unnerving – perhaps an allusion to the hallucinations he was experiencing with more and more frequency during the 1960s and after his trip to Greece.