Gezicht op de Nieuwe Kerk te Amsterdam Possibly 1907 - 1911

George Hendrik Breitner made this drawing of the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam with pencil. You can almost feel the scratching of the graphite on the paper’s surface! Imagine Breitner standing there, squinting at the church, charcoal in hand, quickly capturing the essence of the building. Maybe he was thinking about the light, how it hits the architecture, or maybe he was just trying to get a feel for the place, the essence of it. It feels like a fleeting moment, like he was trying to catch something before it disappeared. There’s something urgent in the lines, like he had to get it down fast. These rapid marks make me think of other artists like Cy Twombly, who make work that captures gesture and movement. It’s like these artists are all in a conversation, using marks to describe and understand the world around them. Each mark holds possibility, a world of potential meanings and emotions. It’s all about the experience of seeing and feeling.