Ploeg op besneeuwde akker 1874 - 1929

Willem van der Nat made this watercolour painting of a snow-covered field, the picture plane populated by a plough and some birds. I'm immediately drawn into this muted palette of greys, browns, and whites, a somber but delicate dance of tones. I imagine Van der Nat outside in the cold, his fingers numb, trying to capture the stillness of the winter landscape. There’s a lovely quality to the marks, that I can only describe as 'wet'. See the way the pigment bleeds into the paper, creating soft edges and subtle gradations of tone? It gives the scene a hazy, dreamlike quality, as if the memory of a winter’s day. The texture is smooth, with transparent washes building up a sense of depth and atmosphere. This lovely painting reminds me of other landscape painters, those who tried to grasp something fleeting about nature. Ultimately, all artists are in a constant exchange of ideas, inspiring one another to see the world in new ways.