Twee roeiboten op de kant naast een rivier 1830 - 1910

Curator: Ah, this image pulls me right in – a couple of rowboats resting beside a river, everything rendered in such delicate lines. The artist is Lambert Jacquelart, and it looks like this etching dates from somewhere between 1830 and 1910. Editor: There’s a sense of quietude here, almost melancholy. The boats feel abandoned, though peaceful, nestled among the reeds and scraggly vegetation. It speaks to a languid stillness by the water’s edge. Curator: You’re right; there’s definitely an understated beauty to it. It's the kind of piece that rewards close observation. Look at how Jacquelart uses line work alone to evoke texture and shadow – from the weathered wood of the boats to the ripples on the river. It is realism captured in this spare line work. Editor: Absolutely. And the composition, too—the placement of the boats leads the eye towards the water, doesn't it? Even that tumbledown fence in the middle ground frames it quite nicely. The artist is leading the viewer. We begin at this shore with still and stagnant boats, but, if we keep moving our vision into the frame, it ends out at an open and lively expanse. Curator: Funny you mention that sense of quietude…It does capture a moment of pause. A fleeting one. When I think of those working boats left ashore... it's like a tiny poem about life and all the pauses in it. Maybe Jacquelart felt it too. It makes one think of those watercolor impressions. Editor: Perhaps. Or maybe, more straightforwardly, the artist has used this simple arrangement to illustrate his understanding of perspectival recession and compositional structure. I agree it could be either of these... or a combination, even! Curator: Yes! Exactly! So good to see, or to simply pause. To make one remember what is and what can be with one's life and the opportunities that flow along with it. A visual philosophy indeed! Editor: I am more aware now of its simplicity, its humble observation of form and the world and, perhaps as you say, the world that surrounds the opportunity for more adventures to take to the open waters. Thank you for this view of a "pause".