Landschap, met op de voorgrond een rietkraag before 1903

This landscape, with reeds in the foreground, by J. Stelzner, is made with what looks like monochrome print. The piece speaks to the process of how we translate nature through an artificial rendering, and how abstraction can alter our experience of the natural world. I'm drawn to the texture in this print, how the blacks and greys build up to create depth and atmosphere. The reeds in the foreground are particularly evocative, created with a series of subtle lines that suggest their density and fragility. It's like the artist is feeling their way through the landscape, letting the marks guide them. There's a dialogue here with the work of someone like Gerhard Richter, who also explored the relationship between photography and painting, representation and abstraction. Ultimately, this piece is about the pleasure of looking, and the way art can help us see the world in new and unexpected ways.