Straat 1890 - 1946

Cornelis Vreedenburgh made this drawing, Straat, with graphite on paper. It's a super loose sketch, and I can really feel the artist grappling with the scene, trying to pin down the shapes and forms of the street. I can imagine him, standing there, squinting, quickly and intuitively making marks that would later inform a more fully realized painting. Look at the way he renders the building on the right. It's almost like a game of connect-the-dots, searching for definition and form. You can almost sense the artist's focus, his energy directed into each stroke, each attempt to capture the scene before him. It’s the immediacy that really gets me, this unfiltered response to a particular place and moment. You know, sketches like these remind me that painting isn't just about the final product, it's about the whole damn process.