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My Own District

This graphite pencil drawing ‘Mariahoeve – 03-05-24’ is my next landscape sketch after ‘Den Haag – Nassaulaan – 01-05-24’. This time it’s my own neighborhood, which is the district of The Hague, called ‘Mariahoeve’. Not a real gem or wandering beauty but it’s home at least. Safe, no spectacular or peculiar things going on, varied construction. There are plenty of flats but also single family homes. The exciting part is that it’s not far from the city centre and The Hague Forest. By now you must have guessed already why I didn’t draw it to date. In my art statement to Den Haag – Halstraat – 12-03-15 I mentioned Baudelaire. His cry to artists to portray daily life i cannot answer with regard to the very place where I live. There are simply too many uninteresting buildings. In fact, many districts here in The Netherlands all look the same.

A Beautiful Path

Nevertheless, doing landscapes again there was this thing gnawed at me. If it were only once to do a drawing of the place I live! After all, there are also trees, little parks and even some canals. Then I remembered a path I walk down sometimes when I go to work in Voorburg. It’s accessible from Het Kleine Loo just before soccer club ‘VUC’. Not many people dwell there, mostly dog walkers. It’s charming though, especially during Spring. Lots of cow parsley popping up. So I walked there yesterday when it was particularly good weather. Also bit of a must really. My bike had a flat tire so I had to go on foot. Therefor I took some pictures of the path. Then I could drawing at Brugman’s waiting for my bike to be repaired. So there it is, a tribute to my own Mariahoeve.

Pitt Graphite Matt pencil (Faber-Castell, 14B) drawing on Winsor & Newton paper (10.5 x 14.8 x 0.1 cm)

Artist: Corné Akkers