Torvet ved St. Knuds kirke i Odense. Aften 1901

Hans Julius Fæster made this etching of Torvet ved St. Knuds kirke in Odense, at night, sometime around 1901. The whole scene is made with these tiny, scratchy marks, like he's tickling the surface of the plate. Look how he uses dense clusters of lines to build up the darks of the buildings, and then leaves the paper bare to suggest the icy square. I love the way that dark sky seems to press down on everything, making the scene feel intimate and a little spooky. And yet those faint street lamps, like tiny beacons, they pull you in, don't they? It reminds me a bit of some of Whistler's nocturnes, the way he uses tone and atmosphere to evoke a mood. But Fæster's got his own thing going on here, it's more folksy, maybe, or just more… Danish! It's a wonderful reminder that art is a conversation, artists riffing off each other, finding their own voices in the mix.