Portret van een onbekende jongen 1878 - 1931

Heinrich Krabbé made this portrait of an unknown boy, and you can see that he built up the image bit by bit, a slow accumulation of tones and shades. It’s like Krabbé is feeling his way into the image, thinking through the act of painting itself. Look at the way the light hits the boy’s face, how Krabbé uses these little dabs of paint to create a sense of volume and form. The paint isn’t overworked, but there’s a real attention to the materiality of it. He’s capturing a likeness but also playing with the possibilities of the medium. It’s almost as if the identity of the boy is being formed right before our eyes. I’m reminded of the work of someone like James Ensor, who also approached portraiture with a similar sense of searching and experimentation. Both artists seem to embrace the idea that art is an ongoing conversation, a process of discovery rather than a fixed statement.