Creating Neo Deco - 10-03-25

Website link: https://corneakkers.com/neo-deco-10-03-25/
Print: https://corneakkers.com/print-neo-deco-10-03-25/
Printable: https://corneakkers.com/product/printable-neo-deco-10-03-25/

Gjon Mili

This graphite pencil drawing ‘Neo Deco - 10-03-25’ is dedicated to the impressive work of Albanian photographer Gjon Mili. Recently I discovered his photographs online searching for art deco-type female forms in sheer dresses. Flabbergasted I was. What a lovely feel for hefty tonality! Enough reason to honor him and take one of his photos as artistic motif. It’s a picture from 1945 and apparently it served as a cover photo for Time Magazine back then. It’s almost as if this image marks an entire era coming to an end. Not coincidentally coinciding with the ending of World War II you’d say. Strolling throug his work I also saw later work from the 1950s. A whole new ball game. Much lighter photography. Equally impressve but I’d trade them in for the chiaroscuro play of light and dark any time.

Dressed up

Lately I am interested in dressing up women again. Female forms in the nude are attractive to draw of course but I wanted something new. Attire can give me that and I got inspired by drawing Carole Lombard. Folds can take on any shape. Roundish but also very straight looking. They support the overall bodyshape, especially when they shimmer through just as in ‘Sheer Deco Nude – 14-10-22’. Selecting and drawing those folds wasn’t very difficult. In fact I quite liked the result. It became more abstracted and cubistically styled than it lets on. And why not? Sheer copying is not my cup of tea and I wanted to enforce the art deco feel even more. Hence some more powerlines dividing straight and curved structures throught the dress. The goal was to have the viewer wander through a cubist landscape that feels almost real.

A Total Darkness

Rendering this one to a total black in the background proved to be a tall order. Simply stratching won’t do the job I noticed. Not the first time though. The problem is that when you hatch it up completely black the paper almost can loose pigment again. Almost to no avail when you try to apply more graphite. It’s almost like you start to scratch pigments off. The solution was to layer the first coat with some HC10 Sennelier spray. It not only fixates but also laminates a bit. Consequently I could draw on top of the first one, retouching spots not yet fully covered. Altogether, a great little experiment.

Graphite pencil (Faber Castell, Pitt Graphite Matt, 14B) drawing Talens Bristol paper (21 x 29.7 x 0.1 cm)
Artist: Corné Akkers