Star Magnolia - a graphite drawing

 

Not far from my home (five minutes walking) are Star Magnolia trees standing in the residential areas and in Springtime they are beautiful. I have painted these before, but this time I wanted to make a drawing, using materials I did not have when I made the paintings.

Using a tinted paper and my water soluble graphite (tailor shape) I made the drawing. Of course some water was used as well after the first layer of colour was on the paper. After that had dried I applied more graphite, mixing the colours on the paper.

After I had finished the first branch with flowers I added some more to make a more balanced composition.

The result is what I hoped for.

The information about the materials I have used, the size and availability of this drawing and my contact information can all be found in  my Tumblr blog.

My Chestnut tree in Springtime

 

It is Springtime and my chestnut tree has lots of buds that are opening now. Some will be only leaves, many will also be flowers. Of course I wanted to paint that once again.

For this work I made several reference pictures and I started with the tree bark in watercolour. Not too much colour because that is how my tree looks in bright sunlight.

After that had dried I added a branch with a flower bud and some new leaves at the end and painted that as well with watercolour.

After that I started with my pencils, adding details and depth by layering the colours on my paper. 

One branch was not enough, so I added three more, only using my pencils, looking for a good composition.

Of course this work is not 'perfect' but with this I am continuing my series with tree bark and leaves or fruits of the trees that inspire me.

The information about the materials I have used, the size and availability of this work and my contact information can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Boomstronk - Conté tekening

 

This is not the first dead tree or tree trunk I have been drawing and it is not the last either. I like the idea of finding as much details in a dead tree trunk as possible and trying to draw them all. Of course I cannot draw all details on such a small sheet of paper - compared to the original tree trunk - but suggesting them in a credible way is good enough for me. Just for the fun of it and while doing this I am also improving my skills.

We (my husband and me) like to make a short walk in the weekend when the weather allows it - and of course only when we did not have the time to go for a longer walk in one of our beautiful Nature Reserves. During one of these walks I saw this dead tree trunk and made some reference pictures.

The drawing is made with Conté Sketching Crayons on grey paper, I often use these materials for dead trees or tree trunks.

The complete information about the materials I have used, the size and availability of this work and my contact information can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Cats in (my) art - for a challenge

 

The March challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken' is about animals in art. 

In my art animals are mostly cats, so I recycled some old sketches to a new 'collage' of cats and made the painting. After that I added some parts of silhouettes using a line marker.

The whole idea was that it would be sketch-like, no real portraits of the cats, those were made earlier.

This is a very small tribute to the cats that I was allowed to paint thin the last years.

The information about the materials I have used, the size and availability of this work and my contact information can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

De Moerputten (The Netherlands)

 

Last month we (my husband and me) went for a nice signposted walk in Natural Reserve 'De Moerputten'. During that walk we made several pictures, for the photo album and for reference. Some of these pictures have already been used for drawings and paintings and here is another one.

The view point is high, here we are on the abandoned railroad and from that dyke we could see over the marshes below. As these marshes were used for peat harvesting there are some straight canals in the landscape, once used to transport the (dried) peat by barge to a road or railroad for further transport to the customers.

This also explains the horizontal lines in the landscape, that are remains of smaller canals that were also used for transport over water.

At one point we had an inspiring view of one of these canals with a very clear reflection of the sky (and some of the reeds) so I stopped to make a reference picture. The canals are not used anymore, so the banks are overgrown and at some points vegetation has taken over parts of the canal, but that irregularity is what attracted me to the view.

Making this watercolour painting was a nice experience, finding my way to recreate the atmosphere of the moment we were there.

The information about the materials I have used, the size and availability of this watercolour painting and my contact information can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Boundary Stone (Netherlands - Germany)

 

Last week we (my husband and me) were for a very short stay in a vacation home near Winterswijk (Netherlands) and the first evening we went for a walk on the boardwalk through the 'Wooldse Veen', a beautiful Natural Reserve. This Natural Reserve does cross the border between The Netherlands and Germany and at one point we passed by this old weathered border stone.

My husband made a picture for me (he had the camera and stepping down from the boardwalk is not a good idea) so I could make this drawing.

I decided on charcoal for the drawing, that is still my favourite for this kind of subjects. 

The paper is tinted, but the picture does not do that justice - maybe that is because of the winter light which is relatively cool.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this work, its availability and my contact information can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Venkantbrug, de Moerputten (The Netherlands)

 

Our walk in Natural Reserve 'De Moerputten' started (and ended) at this bridge, the 'Venkantbrug' or bridge at the side of the fen.

This bridge is part of the abandoned railroad and we had to climb up some stairs to get on the railway embankment (or dyke) for the first part of our walk. 

As we walked towards the bridge, the view of the landscape behind it was beautiful, the colours in the sky were nice, so I asked my husband (who had the camera) to make me a reference picture. At first I wanted to paint only the landscape, but later I decided otherwise.

The landscape is still there and I also indicated the nice pink colours in the sky, but the bridge is very present in my work. For the bridge I also used a line marker to emphasize the difference between the shapes of the landscape (the fen, the trees, the grasses) and the straight lines of the metal bridge.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this work, its availability and the contact information if you are interested in my work can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

'De Moerputten', tree - a drawing

 

During our walk in 'De Moerputten' (The Netherlands) we walked over an abandoned railroad for a while, but of course we also had to return to where we started (and where we parked the car) and that part of the walk went down the slope and over a boardwalk. Where we had to go down this group of trees stood. 

Of course the trees are much taller than on this drawing but the hollow parts, the shapes and colours of the trunks just above the ground interested me the most.

The drawing is made using my Tinted Charcoal pencils - of course I should be using them more often but I can say the same about much more of the drawing materials I have gathered over the years. The colours of these pencils are mostly a bit muted, moody and not fit for every nature scene but this time I decided to give them a try.

The result is what I hoped for because justice is done to the characteristics of these trees that attracted my attention and inspired me.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this drawing, its availability and my contact information can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Dead tree in 'De Moerputten' (The Netherlands) the watercolour painting

 

After our walk in 'De Moerputten' I made a drawing of this dead tree and I wrote in my post about that tree that I would make a watercolour painting of the tree in the near future.

The tree is now in the landscape as we could see from the abandoned railroad looking towards Vlijmen.

The grasses are called 'blue' as they have a blueish shade of green and they are very important to some rare insects. This is only one of the reasons that this lowland peat area is a Natural Reserve. 

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this painting and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

If you are interested in my original artworks, please contact me.

Dead tree in 'De Moerputten' - a Conté drawing

 

Last weekend we (my husband Peter and me) went for a walk in Natural Reserve 'De Moerputten'. The walk was nice, partly over an old railroad that was made for industrial use, part over a boardwalk in the peat lands below the old railroad. We learned a lot about the history of the area and about the work that is done to preserve the nature.

At one point, on the side of the old railroad, stood a dead tree that just asked for a drawing, so I made a reference picture and a few days later I made this Conté drawing using the colour scheme I selected for dead trees.

Maybe I will make a watercolour painting of this dead tree as well, using the colours of the winter landscape that are in my reference picture.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this drawing and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

If you are interested in my original artwork, please contact me.

February contrasts - for a challenge

 

The February challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken' is about the colourful contrasts between the Carnival and the following weeks of Lent. Carnival is about colours and festivity while Lent is about fasting, sobriety and centuries ago about not having much food left from last harvest.

My painting shows a winter landscape in shades of grey and the masks are painted over that landscape. I painted a second layer in grey in the landscape that is not under the masks but still it did take two or more layers of paint to make the masks stand out.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this work and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Wadden Sea, Norddeich

 

In the last week of December we were for a short vacation in Norden and Norddeich. We did have fog the first days, but our last day had clear weather. Lots of clouds and a very cold wind, but we could see much more of the town and the sea so we went for a walk twice that day.

In the morning we had high tide and the water was covering most of the sandbanks that can be used to cross the Wadden Sea at low tide. Of course you still need a guide when you wish to walk on the sand banks, but it should be possible.

During the morning we walked along the dyke from the 'dog beach' towards the harbour of Norddeich and back and during thar walk I made some pictures of the clouds and the sea.

The reference picture for this painting also shows the sand close to the dyke that was not submerged by the high tide - I made the reference picture just because of that. The dyke is so very straight and man-made that it was a nice change to see these sand banks with their irregular shapes.

The painting does not show all the people walking and enjoying the fresh air, but only the sea, the sands and part of the dyke with the 'dog beach'. We were standing on a higher dyke when I made the reference picture without many other walkers near and that feeling of being almost alone looking at the beauty of nature is what I wanted to paint. I think I succeeded and I am happy with the result.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this painting and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog. If you are interested in my original artwork, please contact me.

Tree bark drawing - oak

 

The reference picture with the beautiful bark of an oak tree was waiting to be used for several months and I finally decided how I wanted to use it.

For this work I first made a watercolour under painting, followed by drawing the tree bark with a Graphitint pencil on the dry underpainting. This is how I usually made these tree bark drawings, though the latest one already had an 'extra' by adding the shapes of the leaves.

Now the experiment starts!

Once complete, I used watercolour paint for the colours on the tree, but not exactly as they are. Using the watercolour also activated the colour of the Graphitint pencil I used for the drawing. The Graphitint pencils are water soluble and show a different shade when activated by water. After all was (as good as) dry I used the pencil again to deepen the shadow parts.

So far I have only been working on the tree bark and now it was time for the 'extra', acorns this time. I made some shapes of acorns and the little caps they have with white paper and used these shapes for a first composition. The shapes have different sizes, that is how I wanted to do this. Drawing around the shapes with the Grapitint pencil did not really give the result I wanted so I used a white Graphitint pencil to draw these shapes again.

The result was nice, but not enough, so I almost filled the paper with these shapes I cut out, overlapping in areas and drawing the outlines with both pencils. After that I used the pencils to indicate the volumes of the acorns and that gave me the result I was looking for.

The experiment was nice, combining pencils and paint and making two layers of shapes, the tree bark and the fruits of the tree.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this work and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Roode Beek (The Netherlands) - Conté drawing

 

Last Autumn we (my husband and me) were in the Natural Reserve 'De Meinweg' in The Netherlands and the signposted walk we were on passed by the 'Roode Beek'. This small river is part of the border between The Netherlands and Germany where we were walking.

The reflection of the trees in the water was nice and after making some reference pictures I was sure I wanted to make a painting or drawing using these references.

For this Conté drawing I did buy a light blue pastel stick first, to add to the shades of grey, black, white and some earth colours I had used before. The blue is a nice one for landscapes, indicating the sky colour or the reflections in the water.

The sky was mostly grey that day but somewhere there must have been a patch of blue between the clouds as it is reflected in the water of the river. The trees, bushes and grasses are drawn in the earth colours that are my usual palette when I work with Conté.

The result of my work is what I had hoped for, the touch of blue helps defining the river.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this drawing and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

After the lightning - for a challenge

 

The theme of the January challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken' is taken from a book by one of the members: "Bliksem" or Lightning in English.

What do we do nowadays when there is a thunderstorm? Do we look at the lightning or do we hide in fear? 

This does not inspire me, so I looked a bit further. What does it look like after the lightning?

In our country we can still find oak trees standing alone in a field and these are in danger of being struck by lightning. Sometimes a tree survives and we can see the damage. More often the tree is killed by the lightning and cleared away before the remains can bring danger to people passing by.

Based on the silhouette of an oak tree in winter I imagined one side to be broken and fallen to the ground while the other side is still alive. The time is set in the end of Autumn, some leaves have not fallen yet.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this painting and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

If you are interested in my original artworks, please contact me.

Dark clouds, beach Norddeich - a charcoal drawing

 

During our short stay in Norden we went to walk on the beach of Norddeich on the only day that we had no fog. In the morning we had high tide, the water covered the beach completely and came to the dyke. Later in the afternoon, when we returned for one last walk we saw the beach as the tide was low, or at least lower.

The sand was still very wet and the wind was even stronger than in the morning so we stayed on the dyke for our walk. Now the tide was lower some structures close to the coast - for breaking the force of the waves - were visible now and I made some extra reference pictures.

The clouds were still dark and interesting and the reflection of the light that shines on the water between the breakwaters in the foreground inspired me to make this drawing.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this work and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog. 

If you are interested in my original artworks, please contact me.

View on Norderney

 

During our short stay in Norden, we had some foggy days, but one day had clearer skies. Still very cloudy, but we could see the sea, the dyke and the islands across the 'Waddenzee'.

This is the view on Norderney with the guiding poles for the ferry in the foreground.

Making the reference picture was not easy with all that wind - I had to keep the phone camera still but that was really hard. So I managed to make a not so very sharp picture. That picture is combined with my memory for this watercolour painting.

Again I used my panorama shaped paper to make this painting, the subject is ideal for that paper size.

Of course I enjoyed working on this one safe inside in my little studio at home (no wind, no cold, no rain, just nice and cosy)

The information about the materials I used, the size of this painting and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Dark clouds (Norddeich)

 

After Christmas we went for a short stay in Norden, the North of Germany. The coast at Norddeich is very close so we have been there, walking by the sea. There were some dark clouds and we had a strong wind, but I could make some reference pictures.

As we were there for a short stay, I had only packed my drawing materials so this is an experiment with graphite and water soluble graphite pencils.

I made the drawing of the landscape and the clouds with graphite first, added the water soluble graphite in the clouds and sky and washed that with a water brush.

The result is a nice surprise and I really like to make such study - drawings in the future while on vacation.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of this drawing and its availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.