Boekhouder 1900 - 1935

Patricq Kroon’s ‘Boekhouder’ – or ‘Bookkeeper’ – is a drawing made with ink and watercolour on paper. Kroon is playing with limited colour and line to give us this strange interior scene. There’s something dreamlike about the colour palette: a man with a blue face, sat at a desk, books, an inkwell, and a window view of a figure in a hat, maybe a gardener, maybe a scarecrow. A thick outline of ink frames everything, like a panel from a comic, or a stained-glass window. Look at how the blue watercolour pools and spreads, while the ink outlines stay sharp and dark. The man’s hands are huge, oversized, as are his glasses. He’s writing in the book, he’s smoking a cigar, he is deep in thought, cut off from the scene outside the window. It makes me think a little of Daumier, and also James Ensor, in its strange, slightly nightmarish take on contemporary life. But Kroon’s graphic novel-like rendering is really unique. Is he making fun of the man, or is he jealous? It's not clear, and I love it for that.