Figuren in verschillende houdingen c. 1860 - 1866

Curator: Here we have Cornelis Springer's "Figuren in verschillende houdingen," a drawing from somewhere between 1860 and 1866. The work lives here at the Rijksmuseum. Editor: Well, my first impression is the casual air. Like a fleeting glimpse into everyday life, a little fuzzy around the edges as memories often are. The sketchbook feeling is strong. Curator: Precisely. What Springer captures beautifully in this seemingly simple pencil work is a scene that probably caught his eye one afternoon—perhaps he was seated at a café when he pulled out his sketchbook. Editor: It makes you think about the availability of paper then, right? Sketchbooks were tools, commodities for the upwardly mobile classes with the education and leisure time to stroll, observe, and capture scenes for themselves, to study later, or use as part of another project. I wonder what became of these figure studies? Were they turned into paintings, engravings, lithographs? Curator: That's a keen point, framing its role in Springer’s artistic practice. Given the way he suggests volume and texture with a bare minimum of lines, it feels deeply intuitive to me, less about stringent academic practice. You can almost see his hand flying across the page. Editor: See, I read those airy passages a little differently. They feel economical to me—pencil wasn't the cheapest medium, even if it was convenient, so it might speak more to considered choices. Perhaps his quick execution style was tailored to minimize resource expenditure on preliminary work that would later serve another master artwork. Curator: That’s a thought I hadn’t considered! There's such a tenderness in the depiction of these anonymous figures. That woman standing at the edge of the drawing has such weight to her with her baskets... Editor: It’s work that creates that weight—I'd argue. A materiality defined not just by the paper, the pencil, the artist's gesture, but by all the human labor represented in the drawing too. Curator: Looking at the way the light seems to fall across them, leaving some details sharper than others, I think that the ephemeral aspect really comes to the fore, highlighting that momentariness again. It has this delicate atmosphere about it. Editor: It’s incredible that so much social context, technical choices, and artistic personality is distilled into this single page. Curator: A testament to the richness even the simplest materials and sketches can possess.