Another day of painting together with members of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken', the amateur art club that is active in the area where I live.
This time we were close to my home, in the 'Natuur- en Vogelwacht Alblasserwaard'.
We had a nice walk on the grounds and were given a lot of information about the gardens of the Natuur- en Vogelwacht. This is an educational garden with information for adults and children about the area of the Alblasserwaard.
After that and after our lunch we looked for a shaded spot to paint.
We were standing under some trees. looking on the canal and the fields behind it. That really is a nice spot to paint and we all enjoyed it.
As I had forgotten to stretch my paper, I taped the edges only and I like the result of that action. It looks like the old photo edges we used to add our photographs to an album.
This is not a large size painting, the temperatures are still high and paper and paint would dry too quickly on a large sheet to make the soft edges I like to paint.
More information about this painting can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com
This month I have promised myself to make the most of the prompts given for WorldWatercolourMonth. The weather is hot and sunny so being in my studio for hours is not a very great way to pass the time. I am painting 'quick ones' and these are great opportunities to be experimenting with my materials.
Today's prompt is 'Rainy Days' - something we have not had for weeks now. That is how the idea of the letter to Santa came up and was turned into a painting.
I have used a sheet of watercolour study paper - not the kind of paper I can use for a painting with lots of water.
The drawing of the paper, envelope and pen was made first, then I started painting the wooden desktop using the wet-on-dry technique. The drawing desk in my studio was my model.
After that the paper, envelope and pen were painted, the pencil lines for writing were added and when everything had dried I wrote the letter to Santa and the envelope. Some of the pencil lines were erased, as would have happened in a real letter.
If I were lots of years younger and an American girl I might have done something like this in reality - I think.
As I am not a young girl anymore I enjoyed thinking up this plan and executing it.
More information (materials used, availability, contact information, etc) can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com
This is another painting inspired by the prompts of WorldWatercolourMonth. For today it's 'In the Jungle' and as we don't have a real Jungle in The Netherlands I had to imagine something. The many documentaries I love to watch (on TV) have given me an idea of how a real Jungle might look like so this is the result.
I have started to make an underground with green, violet and some burnt sienna by letting the paint flow on the paper, just guiding it a little bit.
When that had dried I have tried to follow the shapes that had formed to draw my trees, one that was to be the most important and some more in the background.
Then I added some more violet or sienna to the spots that were already there to make them 'emerge' from the background.
All this is done on the Rough paper I had bought years ago to find out whether I would like that or not. I still have not decided yet. I do not dislike it, but on such a small size paper the subjects I choose are different than usual. So I cannot successfully compare this paper to my other, Cold Pressed paper.
More information (contact information, materials used, availability, etc) can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com
This painting has a story that is unlike the other ones.
This one started as a submission for a contest with a 'Summer' theme.
I adapted a scene I had sketched and painted last year and made it an impression of 'Plein Air' painting on the beach. The location is Hoek van Holland (Netherlands) very close to the Pier - where swimming is strictly forbidden.
Of course I did not have much chance in that contest and I forgot to publish the painting afterwards.
This month is WorldWatercolourMonth and I have promised myself to make the most of that, trying to use the prompts given as much as possible.
The last week has been full of other things so I have decided to publish this little painting using the prompt "on the Beach" as its new title.
Even though I knew I did not have much chance in the contest I made this painting for, I enjoyed the challenge of adapting a sketch by adding a field easel with a watercolour painting in progress. This was sketched from memory and added in a nice spot in the original sketch. This was painted using the colours I had used in the original painting and some extra for the easel, the board and the 'painting in progress' on that board.
Sketching and drawing from memory - without a model in front of me - is something for which I did not have enough confidence in the recent past, but this exercise has given me a pleasant surprise.
More information (size, materials used, availability, contact information) can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com
The day I visited the little old town of Nieuwpoort (Netherlands) I have made some sketches on the spot and this view of the former Town Hall was one of the scenes that inspired me.
I have been sketching this from a distance as I was on the ramparts and this building is in the centre of the old town. There is a small canal running straight through Nieuwpoort and this building was constructed spanning the water, protecting the lock in the canal.
The entry of the lock is still there, the dark passageway between the edges of the canal hides the view.
Both sides of the canal have a row of trees that have all of their foliage now.
So the view on the Town Hall was a little blocked by the trees, but what I could see was what I wanted to draw and paint.
My attention was especially attracted by the top of the old Town Hall with the little belfry so I took great care to have those details right.
The view on the Town Hall is so narrow that the only way to do justice to the old building was by cropping the scene to a shape that is not 'traditional'.
This painting took a bit more thinking than usual, but I wanted to do this and it turned out as I hoped it would do.
More information about this painting (size, paper and paint used, availability, etc) can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com
