Naakte vrouw in heuvellandschap 1913

Lodewijk Schelfhout made this drawing with pen in ink, somewhere in 1912. The first thing that strikes me is the overall tonality, it’s almost as if the drawing has been carved out of a single stone. I can imagine the artist applying the ink with a delicate, almost surgical hand, building up a network of fine lines to capture the different tones. You know, it is hard to draw the figure, and I imagine Schelfhout thinking hard about the structure of the body, how it relates to the landscape. The artist is playing with contrasts, juxtaposing the soft curves of the figure with the jagged, angular shapes of the surrounding scenery. It’s a risky move. It reminds me of some of Picasso’s cubist works from the same period. There’s a similar interest in breaking down forms into geometric shapes, it’s like both artists were trying to find new ways of seeing and representing the world. The history of art is an endless conversation!