Figuren in een landschap en schapen c. 1884 - 1887

Curator: Right now, we’re looking at Willem Witsen's "Figuren in een landschap en schapen," which translates to "Figures in a Landscape with Sheep," created circa 1884 to 1887. It’s a drawing using pencil, housed here at the Rijksmuseum. Editor: Oh, this has a really haunting quality to it, like looking at fading memories. The composition is so open and airy, despite all the sketched lines. Curator: Precisely. Witsen’s command of line here is superb. Observe the almost skeletal framework of figures – the artist outlines but does not over define, creating a sense of movement and impermanence. Note how the hatching defines the contours of figures, while the pencil lines simultaneously build volume and dissolve the forms. Editor: I get a real sense of Witsen searching for the right form, right energy. Like he’s letting the landscape guide his hand, instead of the other way around. Curator: Indeed. There's an unresolved quality about the planes, something the impressionists sought to emulate. You have forms suggesting figures, landscapes, but nothing that declares itself emphatically, and consider Witsen's choice to create the drawing in a vertical format. By creating a shallow picture plane, the figures come across as flat, further minimizing the impression of form and creating a very unique and distinctive drawing. Editor: That tentativeness really resonates. It feels deeply honest. Almost as though the real subject isn't the figures or the landscape, but the act of seeing itself. This drawing encapsulates, with simple lines, the very experience of existence! What I admire most is that there are layers of images created at the same place over different moments in time; different versions of what might exist or come into being; of something trying to form out of nothing! Curator: A fitting observation to conclude. “Figuren in een landschap en schapen” showcases an intense moment of observation rendered through impressionistic methods, using line and movement as signifiers for spatial awareness. Editor: It reminds us that beauty and meaning can be found even in the slightest, most fleeting sketches. It makes you feel connected.