Hoofd van een kind, in profiel naar rechts c. 1922 - 1925

Otto Verhagen made this sketch of a child’s head, in profile, with pencil. I can feel the artist working out the planes of the face, the way the light falls. Maybe they were trying to capture a fleeting moment, the way kids never sit still? It's interesting how the child's body is barely there. The soft, reddish-brown shading gives warmth to the hair, but the rest is just ghostly lines. You can see the artist thinking, correcting, building up the form bit by bit. It's like watching the kid emerge right before your eyes. It reminds me of other sketches I’ve seen by artists trying to catch something real. And isn't that what we all want, really? To leave a little mark, a trace of our looking? Each artist does this in their own way, picking up ideas from those who came before.