Zelfportret van George Hendrik Breitner 1880 - 1923

George Hendrik Breitner made this self-portrait with pencil, but when I look at it, I see a mirror image of an artist grappling with their own identity. The dense, diagonal strokes in the lower part contrast with the softer, smudged shading around the face. The lines feel urgent, like he’s trying to capture something fleeting, maybe the way light defines his own features. It's like he’s building himself up, stroke by stroke, but leaving room for doubt, for the shadows that obscure as much as they reveal. Look at the eye in shadow, we are left to imagine the gaze, like looking into a mirror darkly. This reminds me of other artists like Käthe Kollwitz, who also used charcoal to explore themes of self and society. There's a sense of art being not just about seeing, but about feeling, about making marks that resonate with our own experiences. What do you see?