Ontwerp voor de ex libris van Carel Lion Cachet 1874 - 1945

Editor: This is "Ontwerp voor de ex libris van Carel Lion Cachet," a design for a bookplate made sometime between 1874 and 1945 by Carel Adolph Lion Cachet. It's an ink drawing on paper. It looks a bit like peering into a shadowy mirror, all stark contrasts. What do you see in it? Curator: Shadowy mirror is such a beautiful image. I feel it too! I see the tendrils of Art Nouveau wrestling with a kind of primal geometry. The rigid grid of the graph paper is at odds with the organic, almost aggressive, flow of the black ink. The work feels like Lion Cachet is wrestling with how much control he wishes to exert on its form, doesn't it? It makes me think about intention, control versus release... do you feel that push and pull? Editor: I do see that tension now, that play between structure and flow. At first glance I just saw an interesting design, but there's so much more there. Curator: Exactly! It's about the space between things, between eras, between ways of seeing. Almost like a portal, maybe? Ex libris designs often feel intimate and specific, like hidden treasures for the initiated. You know, thinking about his name, “Lion Cachet,” suggests this design is literally “sealed by the Lion”– a fitting mark for something so carefully considered. Editor: That's such a great point – I hadn't thought of his name like that. I'm finding it so interesting how the starkness somehow invites so many possibilities. Curator: Yes! Isn't it wonderful when a simple thing speaks volumes? It leaves you wondering, doesn't it? Editor: It absolutely does. Thanks for sharing your insight. It definitely changed how I see it.