Figuren op het strand van Scheveningen c. 1916

Reijer Stolk made this pencil drawing of figures on Scheveningen beach sometime before 1945. You know, there’s a lot of ways to make a drawing and you get the feeling Stolk was trying to capture some of that windy coastal energy and the buzz of human interaction with just a few marks. Look closely and you can see he’s gone back over some of the lines, maybe searching for the right form, or just reinforcing what’s already there. It's like he’s thinking through drawing, letting the pencil lead him. There's something really immediate and raw about it, you can feel his hand moving across the paper. I can imagine him being buffeted by the wind, squinting at the light. And it reminds me that art isn't always about perfection, sometimes it's about capturing a moment. And just think, he made this without knowing that someone like me would be looking at it and trying to figure out what it means. It’s cool how artists converse across time.