Koninklijk Paleis te Amsterdam c. 1935 - 1936

Cornelis Vreedenburgh made this sketch of the Koninklijk Paleis in Amsterdam with graphite, probably en plein air. You can almost feel the artist, rapidly applying lines, trying to capture the scene in front of him. Look closely, and you'll see it’s a cascade of marks, a jumble of lines. Some are darker, more committed, while others are tentative, like ghosts of possibilities. There’s a real immediacy to the work, a sense of the artist wrestling with the subject right there on the page. The shading is so interesting, it adds depth but also flattens the image so the building almost seems to float. It reminds me a bit of some of the early architectural drawings by Frank Gehry, that same sense of playful exploration. This isn’t about capturing a perfect likeness; it’s about the joy of looking and the thrill of translating that vision onto paper. It’s a sketch that celebrates the beauty of process over the pursuit of perfection.