Creating Batenburg – 02-08-20

Website link: https://corneakkers.com/2020/08/02/batenburg-02-08-20/
Printable: https://corneakkers.com/product/printable-batenburg-02-08-20/

Pittoresque

As you may know I often wander about and astray through landscapes I have never been before or in this particular case I know all too well. This village is not far away from Nijmegen, where I was born and raised. Upon my word Batenburg is a quite pittoresque village along the river Maas. Even though I drew my home town Nijmegen before but hardly any village in the neighborhood. Time to change that.

Castle in Ruins

There lay the ruins of Batenburg Castle and it so happened I saw them on a lovely sunny day when I went to my parents. The tree line at the left serves as an introductionary repoussoir delineating the castle ruins on its right. There were some strong tonally dark blocks underneath them. What I liked about the scene was the lighter bricks creating a stripy rhythym. They gave me some clear visible structures to get hold of. After all, because of the heavy back lighting the scenery was already was very dark. Nevertheless, I love these kind of types of light above depicting a landscape in full display of it. The moat surely is a bonus because it doubles all forms reflected in them, in reverse. That’s the secret to drawing or painting water.

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

Artist: Corné Akkers