Bouw van de toren van Babel 1900 - 1904

Wijnand Otto Jan Nieuwenkamp made this monochromatic woodcut of the Tower of Babel in April 1900. I think he was trying to capture the feeling of upward movement with those vertical lines making up the tower. You can see the whole city surrounding it, but your eye is constantly drawn back up to the incomplete tower that pierces the sky, or the cloud above it. I can imagine Nieuwenkamp, block in hand, carving away with his blade, thinking about ambition, and what it means to reach for the heavens. The artist probably knew that the Tower of Babel is a story about human hubris and the limits of our reach. But I think he also saw the beauty and the aspiration in the idea of building something so monumental, so audacious. It reminds us that we’re all just trying to create something meaningful, something lasting, even if we know it might never be finished.