Vrouwen in Volendammer klederdracht 1875

George Clausen made this sketch of women in Volendammer costume using pencil on paper. The medium of graphite on paper emphasizes the immediacy and the process of creating the artwork. Pencil's qualities of texture and weight allow the artist to quickly capture the forms, and to experiment with composition and detailing. The sketch is a study of the women's traditional clothing, which would have been the product of a whole complex of cultural and material practices. The making of these clothes involved skills like weaving, dyeing, and sewing, and it would also have played a central role in the construction of social and gender identity. The artist is engaging with all these histories of making. So, next time you see a sketch like this, remember that it's not just about the image itself, but also about the processes, the labor, and the traditions that went into its creation. By understanding these, we can challenge distinctions between art and craft.