Portret van een jongen c. 1905

Carel Adolph Lion Cachet sketched this young boy with pencil on paper, and just look at the way he captures the child's delicate features with such simple lines. It's really just a few marks, isn't it? I imagine Cachet's hand moving swiftly across the page, trying to capture the fleeting moment of childhood innocence. You can almost feel him hovering over the paper, deciding what to keep and what to leave out. It looks as if he’s going for something fresh and lively. I see the influence of other artists, too. There’s something of Whistler in the tonal delicacy, and a bit of Degas in the casual intimacy of the sketch. That single stroke defining the side of the face—it’s so confident and assured. You can see a lifetime of looking and drawing concentrated in that one line. It's a testament to the power of seeing. We artists are always in conversation with each other across time, borrowing, riffing, and expanding on what has come before. And it’s that ongoing exchange that keeps the whole enterprise humming along.