Olifant naast een kruk c. 1904 - 1906

Gerrit Willem Dijsselhof drew this elephant next to a stool on paper with pencil. It's all about the line here. The artist has captured the mass and scale of this huge animal with such a minimal vocabulary. These marks, they are tentative but sure, quick but considered. Look how the interior lines of the elephant's body are given as much weight as the exterior, creating a kind of soft, scribbled form. The material aspects of the work, it's just pencil on paper, but it feels so alive. The texture of the paper catches the light, and the graphite shimmers. It reminds me of those drawings of animals by Franz Marc, where the form is just barely held together, on the verge of dissolving into pure feeling. I think it invites a conversation about the impermanence of form, the beauty of a line, and the way an artist can capture the essence of a thing with just a few simple marks.