Twee mannen op een straat c. 1916

Reijer Stolk’s "Two Men on a Street" is made with watercolor and pencil, and it feels like a quick sketch, capturing a fleeting moment. You can almost see him, can’t you? Standing on the street, whipping out his sketchbook. The colors are muted, mostly blues and browns, with a few pops of brighter hues, like that vibrant red and blue hat, or is it a child’s toy? The lines are loose and gestural, suggesting form rather than defining it, and the figures are suggested rather than described. It is as if he were trying to capture the energy of the street more than the details, more like an impression. And what were these men doing? A little snapshot of everyday life. Maybe that’s what Stolk was after, the poetry of the mundane. Painting’s like keeping a diary: a way to record not just what things look like but how they feel.