Kop 1906 - 1945

Reijer Stolk made this drawing, Kop, with graphite on paper, but when is anyone's guess. The lines are so tentative and searching, aren’t they? You can almost see him feeling his way around this face. Look closely at how Stolk renders the nose with just a few quick strokes, like a shorthand for a nose. It’s all about suggestion, not description. The eyes, too, are just hinted at, closed or perhaps gazing inward. The texture of the paper adds a subtle graininess to the drawing, emphasizing its raw, immediate quality. It's as if Stolk is saying, "Here's a face, but it’s also just a bunch of lines on paper." This kind of openness reminds me of work by Guston, who also embraced the raw, imperfect mark as a way to get closer to some kind of truth. And isn't that what art is all about, this constant conversation, this endless exploration?