Vrouw met kind op een bruggetje 1878 - 1938

Richard Nicolaüs Roland Holst made this drawing, Vrouw met kind op een bruggetje, presumably with graphite on paper. What strikes me is the artist’s commitment to process; how a relatively simple depiction of a mother and child is worked out through layers of tentative marks. There's an amazing, almost clumsy directness to the lines used to depict the bridge, and especially the wonky steps on the left – each mark is left to stand alone, as if the artist is thinking through the image in real-time. The density of the marks varies across the image, but it is particularly intense around the figures of the mother and child in the center. This area is heavily worked, suggesting a process of finding and refining the forms. Holst’s embrace of ambiguity reminds me of how much I admire artists like Marsden Hartley, who aren’t afraid to leave a little mess on the canvas. It's like they're saying, "Here's what I saw, here's how I felt, and here's how I tried to make sense of it all." That's the kind of honesty that makes art so powerful.