Water onder een brug c. 1887 - 1920

Here's Willem Witsen’s drawing, made with graphite no less, Water onder een brug. Look at those layered, scribbled lines! They look so tentative, like Witsen was thinking through the subject right there on the paper, feeling out the darkness under a bridge. Can you see how the image emerges from a palimpsest of gestures? I wonder, was he outside? Did he make quick notations, then go back into the studio to work? Or was it just a sort of rumination? There are so many ideas in the image. The almost frantic mark-making communicates feeling and intention—it’s full of the artist’s experience and response to the motif. It’s such a casual drawing, but it relates so well to other sketchers and painters. Think of Rembrandt’s restless, searching lines or Cy Twombly’s free-wheeling scribbles. Artists are always in conversation, bouncing off of one another, creating something new.