Rivierlandschap met kerktoren, bij storm 1872 - 1944

Frans Smissaert made this little watercolor landscape, Rivierlandschap met kerktoren, bij storm, sometime between the late 19th and early 20th century. Look at those cloudy, grey, blues! Smissaert is not trying to capture a perfect likeness of the scene, but trying to catch something in-between, trying to grab a feeling, a fleeting atmosphere. I can imagine him, squinting in the wind, quickly and freely applying those washes of color. See the way the colors bleed into each other, creating a soft, hazy effect. There’s something very intimate about the scale of this piece. It's like a little jewel. It reminds me a bit of Turner's watercolors, that same interest in light and atmosphere. This painterly dance with light, shadow, and form is like all painters riffing off one another, each adding their own voice to the ongoing conversation. They are not copies, but new ways of thinking about a certain form, a landscape. We are invited to see and feel something new.