Kijken Zien Schilderen
To Look See Paint
Looking is what we do all the time, at the other, at the world around us. When we look with attentive concentration we start seeing the other, the world, in full consciousness. That’s what Dutch painters in the 17th century were good at and were perfecting ever more while painting.
The glass in this picture is a detail of a still life painting by Cornelis de Heem. By looking attentively de Heem saw how the light and his studio reflected in the glass and its liquid content. And he painted it with great precision. Seeing a detail like this can make me happy.
Photo of the week: Cornelis de Heem, detail of Still Life with Lobster, c1655, Kunsthaus Zürich, Switzerland 2024
(The title of this post is a variation on the title of the book by late Dutch film maker Johan van der Keuken: Zien Kijken Filmen)
καιρός remembered 
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