A middle-aged man sits upright against a pale yellow background, his body turned slightly to the left while his gaze meets the viewer directly. His face is marked by deep lines and a furrowed brow, with a thin mustache and closely cropped hair that recedes above his temples. The sitter’s expression is serious and intent, his lips pressed together and his eyes sharply outlined.

He wears a striped jacket with bold, undulating black lines that curve across the fabric, creating a strong rhythm and sense of movement across his torso and arms. The collar of his shirt is white and stands open, revealing a dark cravat at his neck. The background is filled with vertical strokes of yellow, ochre, and hints of green, which echo the direction of the sitter’s posture and add a subtle energy to the scene.

The light falls evenly across the man’s face and upper body, casting no strong shadows, which allows the colors and brushwork to model his features with clarity. The paint is applied in visible, directional strokes that follow the forms of the face, jacket, and background, giving the surface a textured, almost vibrating quality. The composition is tightly cropped, focusing attention on the sitter’s upper body and face, with his right arm just visible at the lower edge of the canvas.

Small details, such as the careful rendering of the buttons and the subtle pinks and greens in the skin, reveal the artist’s attention to both structure and color. The Yorck Project includes this work among its selection of 10,000 masterpieces of painting, published in 2002.