Abklatsch van de krijttekening op pagina 1 c. 1884 - 1887

Editor: So, this is a work called "Abklatsch van de krijttekening op pagina 1" – or a transfer of a chalk drawing – made sometime between 1884 and 1887 by Willem Witsen. It’s graphite and coloured pencil on paper. Honestly, at first glance, it just looks like a smudge on a grey page. What do you see in it? Curator: Ah, yes, it's unassuming at first. But there’s a quiet poetry here, wouldn’t you agree? It whispers of process, of the artist’s hand at work, a fleeting moment captured through transfer. This "Abklatsch," this blotting or rubbing, becomes a record of something that was, almost like an echo. Don’t you think it suggests a certain intimacy with the original drawing, which we unfortunately don't see here? Editor: Intimacy is a great word. I hadn't thought of it that way. So it's less about the image itself and more about the act of creating it? Curator: Precisely! Think about the Impressionists, Witsen's contemporaries, capturing fleeting moments of light and atmosphere. Isn't this, in its own way, a captured moment, albeit a much more ephemeral one? It makes me wonder, what was on that first page? A sketch of the canals? Figures strolling through Amsterdam? We can only imagine! Editor: It’s kind of like looking at a photographic negative; there is something there, even if it is hard to perceive the content. And it's cool to consider how the piece fits into the Impressionist context. Curator: Exactly. It's an anti-masterpiece, perhaps, more about the suggestion than the declaration. An artistic footnote if you will! It reminds us to find beauty and meaning in the everyday, even the accidental. Editor: Well, I'll never look at a smudge the same way again. Thanks for sharing your perspective. Curator: My pleasure! Sometimes the most intriguing art is the art that invites you to ask more questions than it answers, wouldn’t you say?