Ex libris van J. van der Ager 1906 - 1945

This Ex libris van J. van der Ager print was made by Reijer Stolk, but at which moment in time? It's hard to say, exactly! I can really see the hand of the artist here, in the stark black and white. You can imagine him, can't you, carefully cutting away at the block. It's a design, of course, but it's also a world. A reader. A thinker. Look how solid it is, how assured. The heavy horizontals, the curves that almost aren’t, all those diagonals. It has the feeling of something being built, like architecture, one stone carefully placed upon another. Stolk is part of a long conversation, responding to those that came before, and anticipating those that will come after. Artists teach one another, across time and space. He’s speaking to us now, after all! And what he has to say is not fixed. It’s always in motion, always open to interpretation.