Gezicht op de haven van Nice 1912

This is Carel Nicolaas Storm van 's-Gravesande's view of the harbor of Nice, made with crayon on paper. You can almost feel the scratch of the crayon on the page, right? The sky is like a faded memory, hazy, bleeding into the water. And the boats! Each one is scribbled in with its own little rainbow. I bet he was out there on the dock, squinting in the Mediterranean sun, trying to catch the way the light bounced off the water. I wonder what he was thinking about as he drew those tiny, choppy lines. Was he thinking about other artists who had captured the same view, like, Turner, maybe? Or was he just lost in the moment, the smell of salt and diesel filling his lungs? The thing about these harbor paintings is they make me wanna grab my own pastels and just start smudging colors together, trying to make sense of the world, one scribble at a time. You too?