Hilly landscape 

Curator: This captivating drawing is called "Hilly landscape," currently residing here at the Städel Museum. The artist, Peter Becker, employed a humble yet effective combination of pencil and other dry media on paper to create this work. Editor: There's something so calming about this sketch. The soft pencil strokes and gentle shading give the hills a peaceful, almost dreamlike quality. It’s quite sparse and the tones seem faded. Curator: Considering landscape art’s role historically, and Becker’s particular positioning, I wonder about his specific intention here. Landscape often served as a site for expressing national identity or commenting on land ownership. We have to wonder, does this "Hilly landscape" fit into this historical trend? Editor: I see what you're saying. Considering land ownership, whose perspective are we getting? If we were to examine the art market during the era in which he made his work, did land-owners have more access to this form of expression? Who are we *not* seeing represented here? I feel a sense of absence or negative space... Curator: Exactly! Becker perhaps subtly challenged, or at least questioned, these traditional roles, perhaps making it less grandiose, and more intimate. Look at how he captures the play of light and shadow on the rolling hills. Editor: True. The subtleties do seem to reveal something quieter than conquest or ownership. In the historical moment, did these visual choices align with emerging political movements? Were these pencil markings aligned with an avant-garde position for instance? I think we have a lot to learn from how social undercurrents and revolutions of thought find their ways into the art object. Curator: Agreed. We see landscape art frequently leveraged to explore complex themes such as national identity, social hierarchy, and ecological consciousness. But Becker offers us something more subtle. Editor: I’ll definitely carry these themes with me as I keep studying not just the art object, but the moment that spurred it. Thank you for helping me understand better both the artistic intentions and the socio-political impact here.