Twee gezichten op een landschap met bebouwing 1880

Curator: This drawing by Louis Apol, dating to 1880, is titled "Twee gezichten op een landschap met bebouwing," or "Two views of a landscape with buildings." He rendered these scenes with pencil. Editor: My first impression is of incompleteness. It's raw, like a quickly jotted note capturing fleeting impressions. The landscape almost dissolves into the pencil strokes themselves. Curator: Apol was a master of Realism, concerned with depicting the world as it truly appeared. Consider how socio-political upheavals of the 19th century shaped the way artists began seeing and portraying everyday life in these landscapes. Apol worked in a very politically conservative period of time, even as industrialization and reform movements began to reshape Dutch society. Editor: Yes, and thinking about it from a contemporary perspective, the rough texture emphasizes the environmental vulnerability in Dutch lowlands. You see these humble structures facing powerful elemental forces. What’s particularly interesting, though, is the ‘two views’ part. It creates a kind of internal dialogue within the single artwork. What does that juxtaposition tell us about how we can simultaneously relate and perceive reality? Curator: Indeed. If we consider the institutional setting, the Rijksmuseum holds it as a drawing, so one function might have been as studies for future paintings. The use of pencil creates that direct link between artist's thought and finished work. There is some scholarship situating this artwork within a framework of evolving representations of labor and nature. Apol was born in The Hague. He had deep connections to the local artist community and he developed a deep connection with landscape from an early age. Editor: And to follow on from that: the work makes you question the very idea of landscape and how deeply our identities are tied to the physical land and how we are placed in and on it. Curator: Viewing this drawing prompts us to reconsider the political landscape in art. Art can hold multiple dimensions. Editor: Right, and I see Apol's sketch now as not merely a sketch but as a comment on the very fabric of our societal existence and visual experience of it.