Portræt af Dupreé 1899

Curator: Here we have Henrik Arnold Hamilkar Sørensen’s "Portræt af Dupreé" from 1899, a study in pencil that is part of the collection at the SMK. Editor: Oh, he looks like someone you’d meet in a smoky café, expounding on… well, everything! I love the immediacy of it. It feels like a fleeting glimpse, a personality quickly captured. Curator: Sørensen really catches that late 19th-century bohemian spirit, doesn't he? It's interesting because portraiture was shifting then, from rigid representation towards capturing essence and impression. Editor: Precisely! He's not trying to immortalize Dupreé as a grand figure. He's showing us a moment, the furrowed brow, the slightly distracted gaze. Curator: And think about what pencil allows - it's intimate. Charcoal and pencil drawings were frequently preliminary works but became collectible prints later as printmaking boomed at this time. Editor: You can practically feel the artist's hand moving across the paper. There’s a rawness there that elevates it beyond just a likeness. He seems lost in thought. Makes me wonder what’s on his mind…politics? Poetry? Curator: It’s compelling to consider how artistic circles interacted at the turn of the century in Copenhagen. There was great support for new art amidst conservative backlashes. Print became a cost effective, accessible way of displaying these figures in their milieu. Editor: It's just wonderful, isn’t it? Such a small thing—a pencil drawing—and yet it speaks volumes about character and context. I could stare at this for ages. Curator: And in a way, that’s the magic, isn’t it? An echo of the past brought to life through line and shading. A simple sketch holding so much history and humanity.