Schoonhoven – 22-02-16

Returning One Day

This graphite pencil drawing ‘Schoonhoven – 22-02-16’ is not typical of the city itself. Some time ago I came to visit the town. The last time must be in 1991. Back then I always felt like returning one day. However, it’s not on my normal route to my parents in Nijmegen. You know how it goes. Life goes on and you forget these things. Then, one day I happened to read a paperback by the Dalai Lama. It was called ‘10 Secrets to a Happy Life’ if I remember it correctly. One advice was to frequently visit a place you haven’t been before. So there I was, walking through a city with no particular place to go. Taking it all in.

Willow-Like

For no particular reason I found no interesting artistic motifs in the center of the city. Actually it’s rather small and consists of some pittoresque little canals running across it. Maybe I found them a bit too corny for my taste and I was looking for that other thing. In the end I already was walking back to the car and then I saw something interesting in a backstreet. There was this interesting willow-like tree in front of a house. I found myself attracted to a combination of straight building lines and round branches.  It remind me to the appearance of tree structures set off against straight structures in Rijswijk – 04-12-15.

Contrast between Round and Straight Structures

Conclusion is that the contrast between round and straight structures catch my eyes all the time. That an allegory on everything manmade and natural.  Straight lines are almost unnatural but in combination with all things curved the both of them look in harmony.

Graphite pencil drawing (Pentel 0.5 mm, 3B) on Canson Bristol paper (21 x 29.7 x 0.1 cm – A4 format)

Artist: Corné Akkers

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