Landschap met een molen 1901 - 1907

This landscape with a mill, or Landschap met een molen, was made by Willem Witsen with a graphite pencil. You can tell it’s a pencil because of the soft, gray, scratchy marks. It's this scribbly quality that makes the drawing so engaging to me. It's the kind of drawing you make when you're just trying to figure something out. The marks are all on the surface, like thoughts being sketched out. The land is far away, and then, what I imagine is water takes up most of the page. Look at those loops and tangled webs of lines! You can almost feel Witsen’s hand moving across the page, trying to capture the movement and density of the water. This drawing reminds me of the landscapes of Hercules Segers, who made very strange and atmospheric etchings. Both artists understood that a landscape is more than just a view, it’s a feeling. Ultimately, art is about seeing, not knowing, what do you see?