Windmills at Dordrecht - by Vincent van Gogh

Windmill is a frequent subject which appeared multiple times in Van Gogh's paintings. In Angust 1881, Van Gogh was taking a train from Etten to Hague to visit his cousin (by marriage) Anton Mauve. On the way back he got off the train to make a record of this typically Dutch scene.

In this drawing, Windmills at Dordrecht , Van Gogh was exploiting his skill with the pen, but he could also capture landscape characteristics flawlessly using other techniques. In a letter to his brother Theo, he wrote about his struggles with the technique:

"Most of them are impressions of landscape, I dare not say as well done as those that sometimes occur in your letters, because still I am often checked by technical difficulties - yet there is something in them, I think - for instance, a silhouette of the city in the evening, when the sun is setting, and a towpath with windmills."

One of the undisputed masters of 20th century art, Vincent van Gogh is renowned for the exquisite delicacy of his drawn line as much as for the intense brilliance of his colour. His drawings are remarkable for the fact that they preserve the vivacity and clarity, giving them an immediacy that is especially striking in dialogue with the drawings of Rembrandt.