Corné Akkers - About Light and Shadow to Neo Déco and Roundism

"I tried to learn how to draw. It took two painful months to understand how light and shadow appear in a drawing. I simply fixed an object, found a place where the light fell on it, and expressed the contrast within the object. Two months were not enough to see through the concept completely, and from frustration I finally decided to stop."

It is incredible that the artist Corné Akkers - who seems to be masterfully masterfully handled with light and shadow in his extensive oeuvre - did not enjoy any formal training in art. It reveals to us as a viewer, as if it would take a lot of time and effort to achieve such skills in order to present what Akkers mainly creates - acts in an abstract form .

The artist and his distinctive handwriting

Corné Akkers came to the world in 1969 in Nijmegen, the Netherlands, and paints and draws since childhood. However, he only grabbed this profession at the age of 35 after leaving a promising career as a lawyer to devote his life of art.

Since then, he has been using a large number of styles that all have one thing in common: the search for a perfect interaction of shadow and light levels on human skin .

In his works, sound levels, soft and mixed color gradients vary in oil, pastel and graphite pencils to create the illusion of depth and mass. It is striking that in his drawings he only uses black, white and gray tones and in his paintings few colors.

This special feature enables its works to emphasize the contrast more efficiently. Abstraction plays an important role in Akker's art .

The Dutch artist - who should be categorically assigned to naive painting - not only looks at the world superficially - he represents its objects in circular lines and cubist forms in order to emphasize volume and space and to break up the dimensionality of its objects.

Corné Akker's way to a mix of styles of Impressionism, Cubism and Neo Déco

In order to understand the current mix of styles Akkers, we have to devote ourselves to his beginnings, influences until the evolution of his naive painting.

The early interest in drawing and painting was probably given to him by his parents. These were very progressive and belonged to the hippie movement. At the beginning of the 1970s they went with the young Akkers in museums and galleries. As a result of early years, he started drawing cartoons, initially cowboys, followed by portraits and sketches of models in the 1980s and 1990s.

Oil painting intensified after the turn of the millennium. Drawing and painting hand in hand in the past ten years.

In his works, the search for light, shadow and geometry of the shapes dominates. The result is a synthesis of techniques of styles Art Deco , Cubism , Abstract Expressionism and a good portion of poetic expression.

Which artists and currents have had the greatest influence?

In addition to the academic art, many sources of inspiration had an impact on Akkers. He himself indicates his interest in art as a hybrid and not chained to formal training criteria.

The Dutch tends to be versatile and combine the traditional skills of the old masters with those of the modernists.

In random order he calls the following artists to whom he feels drawn: Van Eyck, da Vinci, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Ingres, Monet, Degas, Cézanne, van Gogh, Mondrian, Sluijters, Gestle, Dali, de Lempicka and a few more.

The currents that mainly inspire him are impressionism (hence the search for light), pointillism, cubism (obviously), surrealism and a little the good old realism of the 17th century.

In fact, his personal style of roundism an eclectic combination of cubism and impressionism.

As the viewer of his newer works (2022-2024), I can also find elements from the opulent era of Art Deco.

Speaking of naive art: is it possible in art and thus also in painting to ignore the study of classics?

"Actually not." , Akkers immediately clarifies. He calls popular evidence of his statement:

• Paul McCartney claimed that his song "Blackbird" was based on an incorrectly interpreted brook bourrée.

• John Lennon derived many of his melodies from old fishing songs from Liverpool.

• Picasso was inspired by African masks when he created demoiselles d'Avignon and made the first real cubist work of art.

• Monet met Vermeer in Mauritshuis near the Haag.

The list could go on forever. We are all on the shoulders of artists who preceded us. " ,,

so Akkers.

How important is design in the art of Akkers?

Design plays an important role in roundism style. In fact, the files that I sketch are only the starting motif for the creation of decorative drawings. When the drawing is successful, I work it out in oil and carefully select the colors. I hope that my work, which consist of typical vertebrae and colors, can be identified better than my handwriting than the act itself. ”,,,

the artist revealed in an interview in GP Magazine, Italy in April 2023.

Evolution - How Akker's painting technology changed over time

Corné Akkers started drawing portraits and files in the 1980s, inspired by the Degas drawings he saw in the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.

At the time, his father challenged him to find a new style and to work. So he deepened into the abstraction of seeing his preferred way of seeing art. At the same time, he assumed that his impressionist style would be developed well enough and that it would be time to rethink it.

We artists run the risk of repeating ourselves and creating “mannerism” of less quality. ”

The cubism, which he has always loved, helped him in this phase, started again with thick color blobs during detailed painting.

What has also changed in this course is the time that the artist now expends for a painting:

I spend significantly less time with a work of art than twenty years ago, so I can do more and experiment. ”

watch the painter at his work on his version of the Mexican icon Frida Kahlo

What does Akkers see the state of contemporary art?

I think that the love of craft is missing in contemporary art. I teach students at art academies how they can teach themselves to drawing models. Sound studies, knowledge of the color circle, everything is considered outdated, outdated today, while the art runs current trends afterwards and becomes more and more arbitrary. ”

According to Akker's view, art is clearly lacking the ability to attract real attention. In his opinion, this is primarily due to the fact that many famous artists copy a certain style that has proven to be commercial and successful.

This leads to a jungle of repeated artistic hocus -pocus, in which really groundbreaking and disruptive art falls by the wayside.

Where can there be works of art from Corné Akkers to admire?

In recent years, Akkers have shown his works at art fairs in China and, above all, exhibits online. You can find and buy works by the artist here in the online gallery of Kunstplaza and directly from Artfinder .

He fundamentally rejects offers from art exhibitions, for which artists would have to pay for the commissions in advance. On the other hand, he is always open to exhibitions and cooperation with gallery owners.

Corné Akkers at the vernissage of the Ludens Gallery in Voorburg Dutch in January 2024:

In the meantime, he works almost exclusively on behalf. Corné Akkers is currently working as an artist in the Hague and as an art teacher in Voorburg, Southern Holland, Netherlands.