Drie vissen, met kleurnotities 1876 - 1924

Gerrit Willem Dijsselhof sketched Drie Vissen with kleurnotities, using graphite on paper. The swiftness of the graphite line captures the fleeting movements of the fish, while the artist’s notes, jotted around the forms, suggest an attempt to pin down their elusive colors and textures. Graphite itself is a fascinating material, a form of carbon that leaves a metallic sheen. The artist’s hand, in applying the graphite, translates observed reality into an artistic expression, capturing not just the appearance of the fish, but also the process of seeing and understanding them. The annotations scrawled in Dutch around the fish, give us insight into Dijsselhof’s creative process. Words like "blond," "licht," and "goud" suggest that he was trying to capture the shimmer and iridescence of the fish scales. Dijsselhof encourages us to look beyond the image itself and consider the artistic process as a form of labor. This work asks us to consider the relationship between observation, knowledge, and artistic expression.