Architectuurstudie c. 1901

Gerrit Willem Dijsselhof made this architectural study on lined paper, the kind you might find in a notebook. The lines of the paper are still visible, a reminder of the process, like the pentimenti in a painting that show the artist’s changes. Dijsselhof’s marks are tentative, exploratory. The lines are not quite straight, not quite meeting, but that’s okay! It's like he’s thinking through the architecture, adjusting and refining his ideas as he goes. The texture is minimal - the smooth paper only slightly marked by graphite. I love the contrast between the rigidity of the architectural subject and the looseness of the drawing. It reminds me of the early sketches of Philip Guston, a conversation between representation and abstraction. There’s ambiguity here, a sense of searching rather than declaring. Art, like architecture, is a process of building, and here, we see the building in its becoming.