Landschap met bloeiende bomen 1872 - 1939

Egbert Rubertus Derk Schaap made this drawing, 'Landschap met bloeiende bomen', with a soft material like charcoal or graphite to create a landscape of flowering trees. The marks are smudgy, soft, and layered, and there is a real sense of being in the landscape. I imagine Schaap standing there, squinting, trying to capture something ephemeral. There is a bush-like tree in the centre that seems to echo the overall composition. It looks as though Schaap is having a conversation with the foliage as it comes into being on the page. The marks start to evoke that feeling for me, the scratchy lines building up to a dense and complicated network of branches. It reminds me of some of the drawings of Mondrian, where the artists are trying to get at something beyond appearances. Schaap is trying to capture a sense of life, of growth, of change. These artists are always talking to each other across time, like a bunch of gossips, picking up ideas and running with them! It shows that art can grow from ambiguity.