Hamburg Harbor with a Tugboat 1910

Emil Nolde made this harbor scene with black ink on paper. Just imagine him there, rapidly sweeping the brush back and forth. Can you see the harbor emerging from the whiteness? The darkness clumps at the top, thins out over the water. I wonder what he was thinking as he worked. Maybe about the weight of the world? Or maybe the lightness of expression? It's interesting to see a harbor scene rendered in ink, not paint. The ink feels almost violently applied in dark slashes. Look at how the horizontality of the water mirrors the sky. Then see the soft edges of those marks, how they bleed into the paper. It makes me think of Franz Kline, and all those black and white paintings. Artists are always looking at each other, across time, across geography, across medium. Nolde reminds us that painting—or in this case, drawing—is a way to express things that are otherwise inexpressible. The world comes into being through these marks.