Staande geit before 1914

Jan Mankes made this tender portrait of a goat with a pencil on paper. Look at all that gentle hatching – it’s almost like he's caressing the page. I can imagine Mankes, patiently observing this goat, trying to capture its essence with each delicate stroke. The texture of the animal’s coat, the subtle shading that suggests the play of light on its form…you can almost feel the quietness of the scene. There’s a lot of white space around the edges, like he’s pulled the goat out of the darkness and into the light. It reminds me a bit of Paula Modersohn-Becker’s paintings of peasants, that same sense of empathy and connection to the everyday. Artists, like goats, are always grazing in each other’s pastures, looking for inspiration, exchanging ideas across time.