Engagement with city life and urban society is central to Wall’s practice. His work typically juxtaposes figures from different social classes, constructing disturbing situations which elicit a sense of discomfort. The Thinking Man features a solitary man in an isolated spot on the outskirts of the city, indrawn, avoiding eye contact. T. J. Clark points out that the dramatic construction and the perspective is intended to restrict the viewer’s gaze at the work, attesting to the fragmentation innate to human existence in the world.2