Abklatsch van de annotaties op pagina 4 1875 - 1934

This drawing is by Isaac Israels and is entitled “Abklatsch van de annotaties op pagina 4”. The off-white paper is barely marked. At first, you hardly see anything there. It’s like he's trying to find the ghost of something that was already there. Perhaps this is a drawing of words. Or maybe the shadow of a conversation he overheard. The drawing itself is light, transparent, a whisper. It is a record of his thinking. He isn't building a solid thing, so much as pointing to something ephemeral. The smudges and lines are evidence of a process, a mind at work, and that is what makes it beautiful. It reminds me of Cy Twombly’s work and his exploration of mark-making and abstract expressionism. Ultimately it comes down to the idea that art is a conversation, an open-ended exchange of ideas that transcends time and space.