Straatgezicht met een figuur op een brug over een kanaal 1900 - 1931

This is a pencil sketch by Willem Bastiaan Tholen, of a street scene in the Netherlands. The magic here is in the simplicity; just the bare minimum of marks needed to suggest depth and form. See how he uses line weight to bring certain elements forward while letting others fade into the background. It’s all about the push and pull, the give and take. What I love about sketches like this is how they reveal the artist's process. You can almost see Tholen standing there, quickly capturing the scene before him. There’s a raw, unedited quality to it. Look at the way he renders the bridge. It’s not perfect, but it has a kind of wonky charm. The marks are tentative but confident. It reminds me a little of Mondrian’s early landscapes, before he went all-in on the grids. Both artists were clearly fascinated by the underlying structure of the world. Art’s an ongoing conversation, right? Always questioning, always exploring.