Bog oak - a charcoal drawing

 

As I have mentioned before I am member of an amateur art association, 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken' that is based in the 'Alblasserwaard' and 'Molenlanden' (The Netherlands). Every summer a few plein-air painting days are organised in our region and this time we were welcome to paint in a very large garden of one of our members in the village of Giessenburg. The garden really is large and full of inspirational items so every painter found a spot to paint or draw.

In that garden were some bog oaks, retrieved from the surrounding areas when work on ditches was done or a patch of land was prepared for the building of houses. These oaks were at least two hundred years old when they died and were submerged in the peat bog and it is estimated that they have been there up to four thousand years. 

The most beautiful one still had a part of its root structure and I sat down close to it to make a charcoal drawing.

The other side, with much more structure visible was faced to a ditch and too close to it to sit down and draw, so I made reference pictures for later use.

This side of the tree was well lit by the sun and I enjoyed drawing all those little details using my charcoal - and my fingers for blending.

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 artworks, please contact me.

Winter in the polder

 

This week we had snow, temperatures below freezing point and great views! Driving was not too tricky so when I had to go to one of my children I drove through the polder of the Alblasserwaard (Netherlands) instead of taking the highway. In fact I prefer that route always, driving is more relaxed and it is a shortcut.

Of course I had to drive, but I could also enjoy the views of the snow on the fields and I decided I wanted to paint that. This painting is an imaginary landscape, I did not stop for a reference picture. The few parking places along that route do not have the nicest views.

A polder landscape always has some ditches, pollard willows - most of them are smaller than I am except for the branches - a line of trees and bushes on the horizon. When you look in the right direction there is a chance of a village with a church and don't forget the reeds beside the ditches.

So I arranged all these elements under a blue sky with some clouds looking for balance in the composition and I painted the landscape using the colours I remembered, dark brown for the trees, white and a nice grey for the clouds, blue sky and a brownish yellow for the reeds.

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

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

Springtime in the Alblasserwaard (Netherlands)

 

A few months ago I was invited for a Facebook group - and accepted of course - called 'De Project Rembrandt Schildergroep' that is connected to an annual television contest about finding the best amateur painter. I will never try to participate in the television contest, because there is a lot of acrylic and oil paint involved and it very often is about painting people. Things I avoid for different reasons.

But I tried to enter the weekly home contest as often as possible and now the programme has ended (for this year) I will also try to enter the monthly challenges of the Facebook group. This month the challenge is about a springtime landscape, exactly my kind of subject!

My reference is a picture my husband made two years ago during a walk close to our home. When we cross the highway and railroad (by a very nice bridge) we are in the polder landscape of the Alblasserwaard and there these views with pollard willows, fields, ditches, and in springtime rapeseed flowers can be found easily.

The trees just have their first leaves, the rapeseed flowers are even brighter than I can paint and the fields are looking great, I cannot easily find a better 'springtime landscape' than this one.

Painting this scene was not that much of a challenge - after I got the perspective of the ditch, the trees and the fences right in my initial drawing - and I am happy that I managed to get the shadows right to recreate that sunny day we had our walk.

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

And then it started to rain a little....

The weather in The Netherlands can be challenging. Today we planned a day of plein-air painting in the beautiful landscape of the 'Alblasserwaard' (where I live) and every time I set up my field easel it really started to rain a little. After a few attempts I gave up completely and went home. Another member of the group also gave up and most of the others were still inside the restaurant talking. Of course the sun started to shine and the rain stopped completely after I started painting in my studio.

If we had stayed on the spot, my painting probably would have been an interesting experiment in wet-on-very wet painting. Of course I was also getting wet and I quickly lost the inspiration needed for such an experiment.

The title is all about the July challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken', the regional  amateur art association of which I am a member. The coincidence that our day of plein-air painting had exact the kind of weather that we had to depict for the challenge made me decide to submit this painting.

The landscape is imaginary, but based on a scene near the restaurant where our group planned to meet. In the middle of the 'polder' so there are fields, paths, trees, bushes and several ditches. There were some windmills at walking distance (even with my painting stuff to transport) and cows and sheep were visible from our standing point.

I decided to paint a scene with a tree (no surprise here), some fields and the dark clouds that were over the landscape all morning. Because my paper had been wet from the rain, I had a bit of a struggle to get my dark shades in place but in my studio I can speed up the drying process when needed so this turned out the way I wanted it.

More information about this painting (materials used, size, availability, etc) can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

Alblasserwaard, a quick Conté Pencil drawing

We had a great afternoon, painting in 'Natuur- en Vogelwacht Alblasserwaard' with members of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken'.
After I had finished my watercolour painting there was time left for another impression of the area. I did change my point of view just a little bit for more inspiration. This time I chose to make a Conté Pencil drawing.

The pollard willows are a feature of this part of The Netherlands so I just had to draw them.
These are relatively young, the area was designed and planted less than twenty years ago and is maintained beautifully and with a lot of love since then.
The pollard willow is for harvesting the young branches, they are left to grow for three or four years and then cut off. The trunk of the tree does not grow higher than a man's length or a bit less and will grow into twisted shapes, characteristic for the tree.
The harvested branches are used for many purposes such as fences, wood walls, weaving baskets and many more.

Drawing with the Conté Sketching pencils is one of the things I am still exploring. I did like doing this drawing and I have learned a bit more about my materials - and that was what I wanted.

More information can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

Plein Air painting in the Alblasserwaard

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 

Another walk in the 'Alblasserbos'

Our local forest area has two parts that are separated by fields and a Provincial way. There are some differences between both areas, the western area has an old orchard with some high fruit trees, the ones you have to climb to get the fruit. The eastern area has more pollard willows that are still harvested every two or three years.
Both areas are very wet and an early walk is a nice experience as all the birds are singing.
There are signposted walks in both parts of the 'Alblasserbos'.

I usually take my sketch book and pencils with me and I choose a seat with a nice view for some rest and sketching. 
Of course there are lots of trees, bushes and other green stuff where I have made my sketch, so I decided to pick only a few for my composition.

This time the sketch is used for a watercolour painting.
I am still experimenting with different yellow and blue mixtures to get a nice foliage and this time I am very happy with the result.

More information about this watercolour painting (size, colours and paper used, availability) can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

A walk in the 'Alblasserbos'

Because of the nice weather we had lately I went for an early walk in the 'Alblasserbos' , a small forest area on walking distance of my home. There is a signposted walk through the forest that follows a nice path. For the more adventurous walkers there are small paths that can be really wet after some rain.
The name 'forest' is maybe a bit overdone for the place, but for us it is a nice spot with large trees. There even are two areas that are called 'Alblasserbos' and they are both protected. The Dutch word 'bos' means forest.

The signposted walk has a few seats close to the path, each with a nice view. During my walk I took some rest on one of those seats and made some sketches. 
The shape and perspective of the bridge is a bit of a challenge, especially when you are sketching with only one pencil. So I have made several studies to get the bridge right.

I have used all of those for this charcoal drawing of the view that inspired me.

More information can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

Hanging my artwork for an exposition is hard work, but the results are great!

Near my home in the village of Papendrecht is a small forest: the 'Alblasserbos'. This is an area surrounded by grasslands and cows in the polders. A bit to the north are the windmills of the Kinderdijk, south of this area and my village lies 'The Biesbosch'.
In the Alblasserbos is an educational center, 'Natuur- en Vogelwacht de Alblasserwaard'.
In that educational center is the opportunity for expositions and this time I am allowed to have an exposition there. I have selected fourteen examples of my artwork and we have had a busy morning hanging them nicely.

I was really glad I had help, not only my husband gave his assistance, two volunteers from the 'Natuur- en Vogelwacht' and the Amateur Artists Association that work together in the organisation of these expositions were there to help and advise me.

After the frames had been touched many times, I had hard work wiping off all fingerprints!

And here is an impression of the exposition.
Unfortunately the frames with glass do reflect the light a bit too much, not only because I had been wiping off the fingerprints.

I am showing recent work here and I am really happy that the space for the exposition is such a nice one. My works look great on that wall.

More information about this exposition such as the address and the end date can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

Kinderdijk - 2

The Unesco World Heritage Site of Kinderdijk is mostly famous for the windmills, but there is also a nice folktale that explains its name.
For the story I have copied the text on the Wikipedia page about Kinderdijk: 

"The name Kinderdijk is Dutch for 'Children Dike'.
During the Saint Elizabeth Flood of 1421, the 'Grote Hollandse Waard' flooded, but the 'Alblasserwaard' polder stayed unflooded.
It is said that when the terrible storm had subsided, someone went to the dike between these two areas to see what could be saved. In the distance he saw a wooden cradle floating on the water. As it came nearer, some movement was detected. A cat was seen in the cradle trying to keep it in balance by jumping back and forth so that no water could get into it. As the cradle eventually came close enough to the dike for a bystander to pick up the cradle, he saw that a baby was quietly sleeping inside it, nice and dry. The cat had kept the cradle balanced and afloat."

As a reference to that nice folktale a wicker cradle is floating in the water close to the entrance of the site. As we saw the cradle floating I tried to translate the tale to our French guests. I hope they could understand enough of my French to appreciate what I was telling them.

The area has a lot of water, dikes and small bridges and not all the reeds were harvested. The windmills were in plain sight with most of the reeds cut.
I wanted to get a nice composition with some windmills of the 'ordinary' type and another one, the one on the right is a 'wipmolen' or wip mill.  The reference picture I made for this purpose shows the cradle from the tale, so I decided to include the cradle in the painting, draw some extra attention to it and tell the story in my blog post. 

I hope you also enjoyed the story of the baby and the cat in the cradle, surviving the flood.

More information about the painting (size, materials used, etc) can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

  

Early morning in November

Over a month ago my daughter Mariska and me took a bus to an arts-and-crafts event. 
As we wanted to arrive as early as possible (around the opening hour) we had beautiful views from the bus. 
The ride took us through the landscape of the Alblasserwaard, a landscape with fields, some cows and villages and trees in the distance. The sun was still rising and the clouds were looking great. Some of the morning mist was still visible.
Mariska took several pictures from the riding bus and this is a watercolour painting I made after one of them. There are more great pictures so more paintings will follow.

I do not need a perfect picture to paint from. As the bus was driving, the foreground is not sharp and the tree was a bit more blurry than I painted it. The clouds and the mist were visible though and that is what I needed for this one.

The Alblasserwaard is close to my home, although I do not cross it like this very often. Usually I take a motorway, the bus uses a provincial route in order to pick up passengers where possible.

This painting challenged me more than I thought it would. In fact I made the mistake to choose Burnt Umber to mix my grey instead of another brown colour. When I apply my grey mixture on wet paper, the blue and brown will flow each in their own way and give blue clouds with a brown lining. So the paper got a 'special treatment' with the shower and I started over. Still using the Burnt Umber, now on not so wet paper. The result is now what I wanted to achieve and I learned another lesson.

I like this painting, it has a bit of the mystery you can feel early in the morning on a misty field.

More information can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com