My First Session with Her

This pastel drawing ‘Reclining Nude – 10-11-14’ grew out of my first model session with my regular model. A curious mix of impressionism and expressionism. Before that I only hired her for life model group sessions and art class. Back in 2014 my income as artist had grown steadily. Therefor I could hire her for private sessions on a regular basis. Initially we held them at her house and later on in my own studio. She had these Indonesian batik cloths draped over furniture on which she posed. It delivered me a hefty, yellow or golden experience I captured in my oil painting ‘Golden – 18-07-22’ later on. This piece offers a comparable perspective. However, it was executed in expressive hatched pastel strokes.

An Interesting and Unusal Pose

Even though I find pastel great for life model sessions, this one was done in my studio. You just can’t produce strokes like these in a normal two‑hour session. Moreover, I was hovering over my regular model with my camera in search of interesting poses. Then I found the one at hand and was charmed by its unusual angle. Naturally impossible to keep my head upside down the whole time, so I took a picture. I did start a pastel drawing during this session though. Reclining Nude – 28-01-15 was the result but I finished it later than this one which I felt inclined to finish first.

Gloomy Chiaroscuro Appearance

Luckily the pastel kept its gloomy chiaroscuro appearance. Hardly no abstraction because whilst elaborating the drawing I found the use of colours to be the main theme. Also abstracting forms was too much of a good thing. It’s in China on display nowadays. Where, I don’t know because I lost contact with my Chinese agent. He still owes me money for this.

Pastel drawing on Canson Mi-Teintes Touch paper (47 x 63 x 0.1 cm)

Artist: Corné Akkers

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