Annotaties c. 1895 - 1898

Curator: George Hendrik Breitner’s "Annotaties," from around 1895 to 1898. It's ink and colored pencil on paper, and it feels more like a peek into the artist’s mind than a finished piece, doesn’t it? Editor: A peek is right. At first glance, it's like catching whispers in a crowded room. Almost illegible, veiled intentions, full of secrets. There is something powerful, perhaps, because there is a need to decipher. Curator: Exactly! Breitner was all about capturing fleeting moments, impressions. This, I suspect, is where those impressions were first jotted down. Quick, almost frantic annotations before they faded. Editor: Annotations... layers upon layers. Notice how certain words or phrases are circled? Or given longer tails? Reminds me of medieval illuminated manuscripts, where certain words get amplified into monumental meaning. Here, it seems, it's all private significance. Curator: I see what you mean. And I wonder if he ever intended for us to see this? Or if it was solely for his own understanding... Editor: The eternal question with artists' journals, right? Either way, these are the marks left on the paper of everyday observations. I see the way he builds a composition, how thoughts accrue – just like cultural memory itself is built up. It is really beautiful in this way. Curator: Do you feel that too? I do. There is that quality to it – not an obviously beautiful thing, maybe – but there is intimacy that comes out and grabs you when you engage for a while. Editor: Yes! And how interesting that such fragile ephemera – this sheet of paper – can be so revealing. How very potent all those symbols that are contained on one paper can become, right? Curator: Breitner certainly saw something worthy of capturing. Editor: Worth preserving. Yes, a glimpse into a mind making sense of the world. A special artwork indeed.