Tuin met pergola 1925

Simon Moulijn made this drawing, ‘Tuin met pergola’, with etching. The image is mostly tonal, made with short strokes. I can imagine him outside, squinting in the sun, as he tries to capture the light as it hits the stone of the pergola and the softness of the surrounding foliage. I can see the garden taking shape line by line. Maybe he started with the columns and the formal structure and then let the plants creep in around the edges to soften things. The composition has a very grounding effect because the light values are weighted towards the bottom of the picture plane. I wonder if he was thinking of the Japanese concept of *wabi-sabi* or a Dutch garden when he made this; there is such an appreciation for the natural world. I love how the wildness of the leaves contrasts with the precision of the architectural structures.