Barn in the village Aux Posses-Dessous, canton Vaud 1981

Hubertine Heijermans made this etching of a barn in Aux Posses-Dessous, canton Vaud. It’s all about how she builds up the image, stroke by stroke. You can see the way the lines accumulate, they almost feel like they're breathing. The texture is everything here, isn’t it? Those tiny marks, they kind of vibrate. It's not just a barn, it's a field of energy, you know? Like looking at a Seurat, but in monochrome, a kind of pointillism of shadow. Look closely at the dark rectangle of the barn door on the left side, how the hatching is tighter there, to suggest the darkness in the barn. It contrasts with the lighter marks on the walls. Heijermans reminds me of an artist like Agnes Martin, just because of the patience and the obsessive quality, that sense of building something huge out of very, very little. But it's just a barn. Or is it?