Rosaline and Celia 

Curator: This is Victor Müller's drawing, "Rosaline and Celia," housed right here at the Städel Museum. It's a pencil drawing on paper. Editor: There’s something so delicate about this work; it feels as though the artist is trying to capture an ethereal moment, the bare lines hinting at both figures while never defining a single, definitive subject. Curator: Müller, as a Romanticist, was deeply concerned with expressing emotional intensity. Pencil, as a readily available and relatively inexpensive medium, would have facilitated quick studies and the exploration of nuanced emotion and fleeting expressions. Think of the paper itself as a key element in the art making; readily available, and thus accessible for any patron and artist. Editor: True, but consider the figures’ placement. The linear precision, especially noticeable in Rosaline’s garment—creates an echo of Renaissance portraiture, framing the character almost architecturally. The romantic is definitely here. Note the softer treatment of Celia, blurring into something melancholic, though the composition lends the artwork a sense of dramatic staging with each character interacting subtly to generate emotional affect. Curator: I’m compelled to view this, too, as a document of artistic labour itself. A pencil sketch such as this offered both Müller and the possible commissioner to envision how something more complex would appear on canvas; from that view, one can start appreciating the true value and meaning that drawing had, at that time. Editor: Perhaps; from my viewpoint the contrast here, between detailed elements like Rosaline’s face and more gestural lines, creates layers of narrative tension. Incomplete yet suggestive – a kind of structured unveiling, leading one toward an implicit or elusive climax. It also provides an active participation with our own imagination by engaging a viewer at the level of speculation regarding unspoken meanings within it’s implicit realm.. Curator: Thinking of these drawings sheds light on the labour practices and material realities underpinning more elaborate paintings. This piece allows a special glimpse on his workflow and considerations and, ultimately, how resources at hand drove creative processes Editor: I agree; it is valuable for granting us with clues that could potentially reveal pathways inside one possible intent with such emotional composition which could not come any clearer regardless. Ultimately we’re confronted about that delicate balance between process visibility itself as meaning itself; which then becomes relevant on every individual encounter towards Rosaline & Celia’s.