Paard 1890 - 1946

Here’s Cornelis Vreedenburgh’s quick sketch of a horse done with graphite on paper, currently residing at the Rijksmuseum. I can just picture Vreedenburgh grabbing his sketchbook, maybe out in a field, quickly trying to capture the fleeting form of the horse as it shifts and moves. Look at those emphatic marks, hatching back and forth, building up the form with a kind of energetic shorthand. You can almost feel the pressure of his hand, trying to keep up with the animal's vitality. It is so direct and intuitive, a moment of pure seeing translated onto paper. I wonder what else was in his sketchbook? Was this part of a series, or a one-off experiment? It feels like a conversation with other artists who have tried to capture the essence of animals, from Delacroix to Franz Marc. It's like he's saying, "I see you, and I'm adding my voice to the chorus." And that’s what art is all about: one big, ongoing chat across time.