Annotaties Possibly 1907 - 1911

This page of annotations was made by George Hendrik Breitner, but when? The varying weights of pencil strokes, the pale cast of the paper, it all speaks to a process of accrual, a palimpsest of notes taken over time. My eye is drawn to the sketch of what seems to be a roof gable, somewhere near the middle of the page. It’s rendered with a minimal economy of line, almost like a geometric abstraction. The lines are hesitant, as if Breitner is testing out the form, trying to capture something essential about it. It reminds me of Agnes Martin's grids in its quiet simplicity. What Breitner shares with someone like Cy Twombly is the understanding that sometimes the act of noting, of marking a surface, is more important than the thing that is being noted. It’s like a form of thinking aloud, a way of grappling with the world through the simple act of drawing. And that’s something I deeply relate to in my own practice.