Kalenderblad november met vlooiende apen 1909

This is Theo van Hoytema’s ‘November Calendar with Grooming Monkeys’ at the Rijksmuseum. It's a lithograph, so you can imagine the artist drawing on a stone again and again, gradually coaxing these images out of the surface. I love the way the artist has framed the image with monkeys performing different actions. I wonder, did he spend hours watching them, trying to capture their essence? I can imagine him sketching furiously, trying to capture their movements. Look at the tenderness between the two monkeys at the top of the print. I’m touched by the way the artist uses line to delineate the contours of their bodies, capturing their vulnerability and their connection to each other. He's made a decorative but also quite affecting image of November. It reminds me that artists are always looking, learning from each other, inspiring new ways of seeing and feeling. And maybe that's what art is all about - opening ourselves up to the endless possibilities of interpretation.