Compared with Verster’s colourful still lifes, this portrait appears rather sombre and stiff. He has portrayed Kröller-Müller in a black dress and with a serious, even slightly sad expression. The string of pearls, the collar and Helen’s face betray Verster’s great eye for detail. Helene later wrote that she was often deep in thought while posing for this portrait and sometimes felt as if she was in a ‘sleepless night’: ‘I toss and turn inside and yet I sit still at my writing desk or even stiller with Verster.’ The painter has recorded her state of mind exactly in this portrait.
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