Rembrandtplein, Amsterdam 1927

This postcard depicts Rembrandtplein in Amsterdam. We don't know who made it, but I reckon that it would have been produced using some kind of early photographic printing process. What grabs me here is how the colour has been added, likely by hand, and maybe using stencils or some kind of mechanical means. Look at the way that areas of green have been dabbed onto the tree foliage. It’s a little bit slapdash, a bit crude, but somehow very effective in creating a hazy impression of a bustling urban park. It reminds me of the early colour lithographs by Bonnard and Vuillard, where the colours often seem misregistered and the image seems to hover somewhere between representation and abstraction. Art is like an ongoing conversation, a constant process of experimentation and exchange!