Ontwerpen voor een vignet 1884 - 1952

This sheet features three designs for a Vignet made by Reinier Willem Petrus de Vries with pencil on paper. I love that we see these as sketches, capturing a thought in progress. They feel so immediate and intimate. Look closely and you can see the pressure of the pencil vary, giving each line a slightly different weight and character. I'm drawn to the top design. It’s almost like a face, or a funny little creature, with those uprights acting as antennae. What makes a sketch like this so appealing is its honesty. There's no attempt to hide the process, no slick surface to obscure the artist's hand. You see the searching lines, the corrections, the hesitations. It's a reminder that art is often about the journey, not just the destination. Thinking about this work makes me think of Cy Twombly whose scribbly, searching lines also reveal the artist's thought process in real time. Both artists remind us that art is a conversation, a dialogue between the artist and the medium, and ultimately, with us the viewer.