Annotatie c. 1886 - 1934

Isaac Israels made this annotation with graphite on paper. I love seeing works like this: a quick sketch, a jotted note that gives you such insight into the artist's thought process. It's all soft, smudgy lines here, like looking through a fogged-up window. You can feel the artist figuring things out, rubbing out a line, making another, trying to capture the essence of something. I wonder what Israels was thinking, what he was looking at. Maybe someone in a cafe? A quick impression of something fleeting? You can see these rapid marks, the kind of gesture that comes from the body, from the hand moving quickly. It reminds me that drawing and painting is such an embodied expression, that embraces ambiguity and uncertainty. Israels reminds us that we are all in this ongoing conversation, that we are constantly exchanging ideas across time, inspiring one another’s creativity, and generating multiple interpretations.