Runderen in de weide 1879 - 1932

Curator: This is Adolf Eduard Herstein's "Runderen in de weide," which translates to "Cattle in the Meadow," likely created between 1879 and 1932. It's an etching printed on paper and rendered in ink, here in the collection of the Rijksmuseum. Editor: It's moody. Quite evocative, isn’t it? The dark, scratchy lines feel almost… uneasy. Curator: I find that evocative description quite apt, considering the technique of etching. The image begins on a metal plate, where lines are bitten into the surface by acid. The amount of labor that goes into the work to produce different textures is profound. Editor: And the contrast really jumps out. Those heavy inks defining the shapes of the cattle and that slightly blurred foliage in the background…it’s interesting how he chooses to use varying levels of definition, wouldn't you say? It’s like a half-remembered scene. Curator: He certainly uses the materiality of etching to full effect. Look at how he builds depth using cross-hatching to suggest both the density of the cattle’s bodies, but also the shadow of the tree looming nearby. You could say it is representational and documentary of agricultural life and practices of the period, particularly how open land became managed, measured spaces. Editor: Absolutely. It makes you consider all the physical processes: the grain of the paper itself, how it absorbs the ink; the artist’s hand and the pressure applied. The piece emphasizes this connection to the natural world. Curator: Exactly. While the subject is representational of grazing cattle, Herstein is actually making a very conscious choice to engage with realism and also an element of abstraction in those strokes. A scene grounded in earthy reality, then abstracted again and again. Editor: I think I'll carry that “grounded yet abstracted” vision with me, certainly when viewing a different work later. Curator: A lovely intersection of the terrestrial and the artistic, isn't it? Just like the cows themselves are doing as they wander on the plains.