Koeien in een weide 1848 - 1888

Curator: This is Anton Mauve's "Cows in a Meadow," a pencil drawing created sometime between 1848 and 1888. It's currently held in the collection of the Rijksmuseum. Editor: It has this ghostly, ephemeral quality, doesn't it? Like a memory of a landscape. The sparse use of pencil emphasizes the almost careless attention the artist appears to give this pastoral setting. Curator: Absolutely. Mauve's connection to the Hague School positions him within a context of artists deeply invested in portraying the Dutch landscape and rural life. But what makes it striking is the representation of labor and animal existence within an increasingly industrialized society. There’s a quiet commentary, perhaps, on the agrarian traditions of the Netherlands as modernity encroached. Editor: And the immediacy of the sketch feels vital to that commentary. You see the pressure of the pencil, the quick strokes shaping the cows. The materiality speaks to a process – a working through of an idea rather than a polished, idealized view. What kind of paper did he likely use, and did the support afford to convey shadow in short, dense lines as we see in some parts of the herd’s forms? Curator: We can speculate based on the period that Mauve had access to machine made paper but there also could be signs of textured laid paper if the work is held up close. Mauve’s position as a somewhat peripheral figure allows us to engage questions related to access, training, the support systems that upheld Dutch artistic institutions, especially when discussing representations of rural life. Consider also his familial relationship to Van Gogh, as well as Mauve's art dealership…all things being decidedly linked. Editor: Yes! It's about labor on multiple levels, not just that of the cows in the field, or even Mauve, but also the very systems propping it up! This piece gives us more than meets the eye; from gender to medium to the commodification of everyday life at a period in great social change. It's pretty exciting to unpack. Curator: Indeed. Looking closely at art offers critical lenses for exploring not only art but the times we live in now. Editor: It shows that the choices in creating artwork—medium, scale, subject—often contribute layers of insight!