Kalenderblad oktober met vliegende eenden 1908

This is Theo van Hoytema’s ‘Kalenderblad oktober met vliegende eenden’ at the Rijksmuseum. It's a print, and it makes me think about graphic design and how paintings get used. I can imagine Hoytema making this. Is he sketching outdoors, balancing on a riverbank? The marks feel like they could be made quickly in pen and ink. The monochromatic greens and browns create a sense of dampness and cold, really invoking a feeling of Autumn in the Netherlands. Look at the downward strokes indicating rain, which is typical for Dutch calendar pages, but more than that they’re pure expression. They could be Cy Twombly marks, scribbles that create space. Then there are the ducks themselves, a flurry of wings and bodies, captured mid-flight, really dynamic! It makes you wonder about all the calendar artists out there. Who are they? Are they thinking about Mondrian? I bet they are.