signed with monogram ‘SR’ in a circle pastel
39.7 x 48 cm

Provenance:
With Simonis & Buunk, Ede.

It is no doubt partly due to his many talents that Sjoerd Hendrik de Roos’ activities as
a draughtsman are today largely forgotten. It is for his book cover designs, type face designs, and stamps, instead, that the artist is still best known. However, that the De Roos was an exceptionally talented draughtsman too is attested by the artist’s portrait- and landscape drawings that have survived. While his portrait drawings clearly reveal the influence of Jan Toorop (1858-1928), his landscape drawings show the influence by a range of different artists and styles.

De Roos was keen on nature and his landscape drawings are a testimony to this. As observed by G.W. Ovink, De Roos did not capture nature in swiftly executed drawings in a sketchbook, but, as one could expect from a type and letter designer, in more densely drawn, precise and highly finished drawings. [1] Drawing did not need to provide the artist with an income, allowing De Roos the freedom to experiment with different styles and subjects at his leisure. The present drawing, which was likely executed in the first decade of the 20th century judging the artist’s symbolist signature, [2] is a fine example of De Roos’ flirtation with different styles including symbolism, pointillism and impressionism. The drawing blurs these styles effortlessly; the haystacks are depicted with long, fluent strokes while short strokes and dots render the grass as well as light and shade. A connoisseur and collector himself, De Roos no doubt was well aware of the works he is referencing here, not the least those by Claude Monet, who created his famous haystack series some ten years earlier. Another drawing of haystacks by De Roos is in Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem. [3]

[1] G.W. Ovink, Bij tien tekeningen van de S.H. Roos, Wageningen, 1942 (not paginated).
[2] The same signature appears on a drawing depicting De Roos’ father from 1902; see RKD, image number 3389982.
[3] See exhib. cat., Moderne kunst-keuze uit het frans hals museum, De Hallen, Haarlem, 1970, no. 70, ill.