Ontwerp voor kostuum voor Boschnymph 1910 - 1918

Richard Nicolaüs Roland Holst made this costume design for Boschnymph with what looks like watercolour, or perhaps gouache. The nymph's garments, the green shawl and grey dress, are outlined with such care, and filled in with flat washes. It makes me think about the way abstract painters like to work, carefully laying down the parameters of an area and then filling it in. There’s such a mix of styles here: Holst uses both thin, transparent washes of colour to describe the sky and grass, as well as opaque blocks of colour, like in the dark ground. The grass is just amazing, look at the variety of marks he makes, tiny dashes of green, some blended, some standing alone. It reminds me of Van Gogh's paintings of fields. Ultimately, what this work conveys, is the endless conversation that art represents, artists borrowing, adapting and responding to those that came before, in an endless cycle of reinterpretation.