Creating L’Inconnue de la Seine – 12-10-25

Website link: https://corneakkers.com/inconnue-de-la-seine-12-10-25/
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Unsolved Mystery

This graphite pencil drawing ‘L’inconnue de la Seine – 12-10-25’ handles a curious case of an unsolved mystery. Imagine a beautiful yet drowned woman and the 1880s Parisian coroner didn’t have a clue. He couldn’t discover any signs of a wrongful death. Notwithstanding the fact he felt attracted to her beauty, even in death. So a paster cast was ordered to capture it, not knowing it would become world famous and therefor immortilize her. Well, to be honest, there are several stories about her but this is the most common heared. Personally, I knew this story for many a year and I even stored a photo on my computer. At that time I didn’t have a faintest clue what to do with it. That is, until now. Hence the drawing came as natural as the light will always guide me. Of which I consider to be myself a discipline of.

Bringing Her Back to Live

After Lady Chatterley’s Lover – 05-10-25 I wanted to follow the trend of realism of late. Why not? Two wandering beauties in one row. Honestly, I also wanted to see whether I could bring her alive and with a max realist result. No cubist styling this time, only bringing her alive and that was my very point. Most artworks depicted her being dead in the past. Why not breathe live into this beautiful young woman and let her tell you the story herself? So I imaged her, walking down the banks of the river Seine. Perhaps it was a suicide or maybe a wrongful death after all. Perhaps that GP killed her because she was pregnant of him and he followed her along the quay. Anyway, she must have known her times of joy and cheerfulness in her life. In the afterlive she will tell me, she promised.

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