Pastoral 1919

This print of a pastoral scene was made by Hans Thoma, sometime around 1919. Look closely and you'll see it’s made with all these tiny little etched lines. It’s like he's building up the forms, the animals and the figures, bit by bit. You know, when you really look at art, it's not just about what's depicted, but about the marks themselves. Take a look at the pigs drinking water, see how the lines are denser, darker there? That’s where the shadows are, giving the pigs form and weight. The artist seems to be enjoying this process, almost obsessively layering these marks. The animals don't seem to mind being so close together, the calf, the pigs, the goat - they are all listening to the young boy playing the flute. It reminds me a little of Samuel Palmer, with that same kind of dreamy, romantic feeling. It’s a reminder that art is always a conversation, artists speaking to each other across time, through these funny little marks they leave behind.