Annotaties 1907 - 1909

This page of annotations was made by George Hendrik Breitner, likely with graphite or a similar material, sometime in the late 19th or early 20th century. You can see the hand of the artist so clearly here, the way the medium allows for a direct translation of thought onto paper. The surface is so unassuming, this is clearly a working document not a finished piece. The writing is all very faint, as if the artist was trying not to commit too strongly to any one idea. Look at the way the words are scattered across the page, some underlined or circled, as if in conversation with one another. It's like a map of the artist’s mind, a record of fleeting thoughts and observations. It reminds me of Cy Twombly's notebooks, in the way that it elevates the act of note-taking to an art form. It celebrates the beauty of imperfection, of process, of the ongoing dialogue that is artmaking.