Vrouwenhoofd 1875 - 1934

Isaac Israels made this drawing, Vrouwenhoofd, with pencil on paper, and it lives at the Rijksmuseum. It’s really great how Israels captures the essence of a face with such economy. It’s like he’s thinking through the image, letting the process be visible. He is using the pencil in a painterly way, not trying to hide the marks, and you can see the pressure of the pencil as it hits the page, really digging in around the eyes to suggest depth and shadow. Then he floats up to the hair, where he uses the pencil to suggest its texture and volume, almost scribbling in a way that feels very free and uninhibited. The whole drawing is like a conversation, a back-and-forth between the artist and the paper, and it's this quality that makes it feel so alive. Think of it as a cousin to the expressive drawings of Käthe Kollwitz. It reminds us that art is always an ongoing exchange of ideas, an exploration of the world through the act of making.