Ontwerp voor een monumentale bank c. 1930

Curator: Here we have a drawing, a pencil sketch titled "Ontwerp voor een monumentale bank," which translates to "Design for a Monumental Bench." It was conceived around 1930 by Carel Adolph Lion Cachet and now resides here at the Rijksmuseum. Editor: It looks… fragile, somehow. Like a whisper of an idea rather than a solid, sit-upon thing. The lines are so tentative, like the artist was feeling it out. Is "monumental" really the word for this? Curator: The term speaks to ambition and intended scale, perhaps more than the execution of this preparatory drawing itself. Keep in mind that, in the early 20th century, "monumentality" was about creating spaces and objects that reinforced social cohesion, embodying ideals of progress. Editor: Okay, I get the societal part, the communal intention, but the material itself seems almost… ephemeral for that. I'm thinking it could also symbolize something fleeting. That geometric base – almost like puzzle pieces – is cracking, while those serpentine swirls framing the sketch look more like escaping thought than concrete support. Curator: That contrast you highlight is, in a sense, what Modernism aimed to address – the reconciliation between traditional artistic values and the needs of an increasingly industrial and urban society. These pieces suggest stone masonry in their sketched geometry; however, that top element gives it an updated dynamic that almost feels classical at the same time. It speaks to ideas of timelessness… Editor: I see that tension in the drawing as a kind of wistful, almost melancholy quality. It suggests how hard it might be to establish lasting solidity in this rapidly evolving and unstable world. To think that the intention of its very design wanted to be to embody such ideals! Curator: And how often intentions diverge from eventual reality, particularly where art is concerned. Lion Cachet's background offers an interesting perspective on these aspirations too. He navigated artistic practices during shifts in the understanding of art’s socio-political agency. Editor: Exactly. It is kind of romantic to me that this drawing holds all these struggles, right here. A solid plan in delicate lines…It gives it power in a really strange way!