ONCE CALLED SILVERPOINT The humble pencil - everybody on every continent uses it - for everything mundane, from writing a grocery list to working out a math problem to solving a crossword puzzle, to doodling idly on a piece of scrap paper while chatting on the phone. But this simple tool holds a much more elegant and powerful use - creating museum quality art. Amazing - a slender piece of wood with a round graphite stick in the middle - can, in the proficient hand, create masterpieces that cause hearts to flutter. Jan van Eyck way back in the late 14th century, Raphael, Michelangelo, Dürer, da Vinci, Holbein, and many, many others sketched with it, not for use as an end in itself, but as a prelude to a painting or etching. Before the 17th century this glorious medium was called silverpoint , and the stylus was made of silver or some other hard metal drawn on specially treated paper. There was no variation of strength in the line and no erasing; one error and you'd ha