Marlot – 11-04-23

Merely a Park

This graphite pencil drawing ‘Marlot – 11-04-23’ follows my previous one depicting the Noteboompark in Voorburg. We stay in the region because Marlot is not far away from where I live as well. Just around the corner so to speak. Consequently I am a lot to be found there. Especially during Corona times when I walked through Park Marlot, both the residential area and the forest. Well, in The Netherlands well it comes to nature everything is relative. Hardly a forest, merely a raked park really with a couple of canals and meadows running across it. I even sketched such a little canal a couple of years back. It is one of those parks characteristic of The Hague. Trees, a big meadow and an old country house can be found in each and every one of them.

A Perfect Combination

And so does Marlot have one: an old house dating back from the 17th century. For no particular reason I haven’t drawn that one before. Time to add it to my list of completed park projects. A couple of more to go. Another reason was the other day I was walking towards ‘Huis Marlot’. Suddenly I was confronted with a great view on the house underneath a tree in blossom. There is a little pond between the building and the tree which made the scenery perfect for a drawing. To me that’s the perfect combination: a man-made structure, water (reflections) and vegetation.

Overcoming Difficulties

Like always every little art work in the making presents its difficulties to overcome. I found it relatively tough to contrast the dark blue sky with the blossoms. Whereas the thick branches were dark enough the blossoms and little leaves were too weakly light. The hatched strokes simply seemed to absorb them, creating a fidgety look. So I had to fade out the hatchings a bit in order to get the desired contrast: smooth and busy pencil lines. All-in all a nice impressionist study to execute.

Graphite pencil drawing (Sakura 0.5 mm, 4B) on Winsor & Newton Bristol board paper (21 x 14.8 x 0.1 cm – A5 format)

Artist: Corné Akkers