Landskab 1864 - 1941

This is a landscape drawn by Niels Larsen Stevns, probably made with graphite on paper. I love the raw energy of this drawing, its kind of anxious mark-making. It feels like the artist was trying to capture something fleeting, maybe the way light flickered through the trees, or the feeling of being surrounded by nature. I can imagine Stevns standing there, sketchbook in hand, quickly sketching what he saw. Maybe he was thinking about other artists who had tried to capture the landscape, like the Impressionists, but he wanted to do something different, something more immediate and personal. The vertical strokes could be trees, the wavy lines could be water. But it's also about the act of drawing itself. The way the pencil moves across the paper, the pressure of the hand, the feeling of the graphite scratching against the surface. It reminds me that art is a conversation, and we're all just adding our own voices to it. Each mark is a response to what came before, and an invitation to what will come next.