Liggende vrouw en vliegende ruiter met fakkel 1914

Max Alexander Alandt made this lithograph called, Liggende vrouw en vliegende ruiter met fakkel – or Reclining woman and flying rider with torch – using crayon and brush. I really feel for the artist here. You can see Alandt building up layers and experimenting with the smoky darkness of crayon. Imagine him, or her, smudging and blending, pulling back and adding more. You get this sense of brooding, dark grays meeting a hint of warm light. It makes me think of Caspar David Friedrich. But then there’s this floating, almost comic-book-like figure on horseback. It is as if Alandt is channeling Symbolist ideas and also finding his own weird version. You can see him thinking about different kinds of mark-making, from the softness of the sky to the sharp lines of the buildings. What happens if I make this mark? Where will it lead me? It's like he is saying, "Let’s throw all these feelings and ideas into the ring and see what happens." Artists do that all the time – try things out, see what works, and in the process, nudge the conversation along.