Figuur slaat ander figuur neer 1891 - 1941

Leo Gestel made this drawing, Figuur slaat ander figuur neer, with pencil on paper. Isn’t it interesting how such a simple medium can convey so much? You see these tangled, almost frantic lines. It’s like the artist was wrestling with the subject, trying to capture a fleeting moment of action and emotion. I imagine Gestel hunched over this page, scribbling away, trying to nail down the raw energy of the scene. It feels like a study in the way one body can dominate another. Those repeated lines give it a sense of movement, almost like a stop-motion animation. There's a frenetic energy, echoing the cubist works of his contemporaries like Picasso and Braque who were similarly preoccupied with fragmented forms and multiple perspectives. It's as if Gestel is saying: this is not just a single image, but an event unfolding. And it reminds us that every mark, every gesture, is part of a larger conversation that spans across time and artists.