Trees and Hills

This graphite pencil drawing ‘Filosofendal (Valley of the Philosophers) – 20-10-15 is all about trees and hills. Situated in Berg en Dal it’s close to where I was born. My aunt lived there (in Beek) and there is not a time I can’t remember the Filosofendal. A bit of a wandering beauty everyone from Nijmegen has to visit once in his or her lifetime. Steep paths that run upwards unlike everything you’ll normally see in The Netherlands. Perhaps a bit strange for people who live in countries with elevations above 1,000 meters but for the dutch as flatlanders every hill is sacred.

Taking Pictures

What I regularly do is visit my parents during weekends. Just before or after my visit I drive through Berg en Dal to take some pictures. Even do a little sketch if I have the time. I even imagine living there and having all the time to set up my easle on a hill. Anway, one time it came to be I had very little time left. Furia, my cat, probably was anxiously waiting for me to return. That’s no reassurance for quietly taking pictures and wandering about carefreely. Only presumption of course and such a thought only clouds your mind. You shut yourself off for all the beauty that’s right in front your eyes. So I closed my eyes and did a bit of a 1 minute meditation. The cat can wait for half an hour longer, can’t she?

Cubism

When I opened up my eyes there it was. There I saw a wonderful hilly treescape that immediately inspired me to do this drawing at hand. Cast shadows beautifully slanted their way downwards the hills. Somehow they reminded me to earlier aspects of my personal cubist style. So I decided to totally break up this forest into planes of light, darkness and cubist forms. Maybe this could be another keystone in my oevre. Last landscape I did was Rotterdam-Overschie – 18-06-15 and that one only showed some aspects of cubism. This one goes much further and quite to my satisfaction!

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

Artist: Corné Akkers

Sales info: info@corneakkers.co

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