View on Monswiller - a winter fantasy

 

This time I was inspired to paint a Winter mood and - as it is not yet Winter in The Netherlands - I looked for a reference in my old sketchbooks. This scene, a view from a roadside restaurant on the small town of Monswiller inspired me.

Of course I had painted a watercolour inspired by this scene short after I made the sketch, but this time I wanted to change a lot, not only did it have to be a Winter fantasy, I also changed the format from 'landscape' to 'portrait' so there would be much more sky and a bit more foreground.

The church tower is placed at a 'good' spot in the composition (one third from below and one third from the right side) and I made the drawing starting from that place, adding some slopes to the foreground and leaving room for a nice cloudy sky.

Using some of the colours that are not my first choice I set myself another small challenge, but sometimes I wonder why these colours are not so often used - maybe it's about habit.

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.

Coffee with a view

This autumn my husband and me were on a short vacation again. This time we wanted to go a bit further from home than last year so on the way we had to make some (coffee) stops. The last one was on the parking place near Monswiller in France, just before crossing the border to Germany. The coffee was nice and so was the view from our table.
Because there was a small construction zone at the end of the parking place I only made a sketch, no reference picture. 

The church tower did catch my attention. It was visible from behind some bushes and was high enough to be seen above the mountains in the distance. Houses were visible around the church and the village also has some trees. 
The village is situated in a small valley but the higher parts were showing themselves, almost asking to be sketched and painted.

I decided to use warm autumn colours again and the paper I used is new for me. 
I have bought a small size block of Arches paper in  a special offer and decided to try that on vacation. This really is great paper!

More information about this watercolour can be found at www.jannekesatelier.webs.com