Holly

 

Last weekend we (my husband and me) went for a nice signposted walk in the 'Kalmthoutse Heide', a beautiful Natural Reserve on the border between Belgium and The Netherlands, not too far from where we live. 

Very soon after I left the car, my attention was caught by a nice holly bush with lots of red berries. Of course I made some reference pictures and added some more holly reference pictures during our walk.

The holly inspired me to paint, so that is what I did. Mixing greens for a background, adding violet for contrast was the first step. After that had dried I used a watercolour pencil for the drawing of the holly branches and then I had to paint them.

At first, I wanted to add a special effect I had seen in an online short video, but after the background was made I decided otherwise. That special effect will be used once, in another painting. The green of the leaves was mixed with a blue, a yellow and sometimes a touch of violet for the darker areas. It was fun to create all these colours and to let the leaves at the edges of the painting fade away into the background.

The red berries were the finishing touch, a nice contrast with the green of the leaves and background, just as they were when they caught my attention.

This watercolour will not be used for a Christmas card this year - I already have them waiting for the right moment to send - but painting these leaves and berries did get me in a nice festive mood, forgetting the grey weather for a few hours.

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 work, please contact me.

Holly branch

Near my street is a row of holly bushes, kept low and in a nice shape by the gardeners of our community and I pass by it very often and admire the red berries, green leaves and nice shapes.

Of course I wanted to paint these and last summer I have learned how to do that.
I made a sketch of a branch with leaves and berries using several pictures as my reference, making up an imaginary branch of holly that i would like to paint. This branch would have to get a background with a 'window' that is reserved with tape while the outline is darkened with several layers of watercolour paint.

For my colour scheme I decided on a grey background with touches of the red I wanted to use for the berries. The green of the leaves is mixed with the blue-grey that also is in the background and the brown colour of the branch is also used in the background. 
This limited palette gives a bit of tranquillity to the painting.


After my background was painted, dried and the masking tape removed I made a drawing of the branch, using my sketch as example. I had to adapt the final branch a little as some of the colour of the outline had bled into the bright part. Most of that is covered by a large leaf now.
While doing this I decided to experiment with my Iridescent Medium, this was used in the parts of the leaves that have the dark background. The medium was mixed directly with the paint (one of the suggestions of the manufacturer of both the paints and the medium) and I really like the result that is achieved in this way.
After all it will be Christmas in a few days and I am more than a bit 'in the mood'.

The details about size, paper and paints used, availability etc can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com