Stilleven met schedel 1911 - 1943

Arend Hendriks made this still life with a skull, called "Stilleven met schedel," as an etching. You know, the kind where you scratch into a plate, ink it, and press it onto paper. Look at how the lines build up the form. There’s a real tenderness in the way Hendriks handles the light and shadow here, and the way he’s used texture. Check out the craggy surface of the skull. It's resting on some old books, with the beads trailing over the edge. The books have these beautiful little carved patterns, almost like abstracted flowers, that add to the overall feeling of melancholy and beauty. It reminds me a little of the work of Hercules Seghers, another Dutch artist who was a master of the etched landscape. Both artists seem interested in capturing a sense of mood, evoking the idea of death and decay in a way that is oddly life-affirming. It’s not just about the end, but about the strange beauty that exists in the space between life and death.