View from the train Alençon - Le Mans (France)

 

Every summer my husband Peter travels to France for his volunteer work. He stays away from home two days and often sends me pictures of where he has been. This time he sent me a picture of the view from the train from Alençon to Le Mans and I decided to paint it.

As it is still warm and damp, I had to use my hairdryer to dry the painting between layers and even then the paper would get damp again in places I had not touched with a brush after using the dryer. So the result is more atmospheric than detailed, but I don't mind that in a landscape.

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

Port-en-Bessin, October sunset

Last October we had one bright day in Port-en-Bessin (Normandy,France) and we enjoyed it from the first until the last moment. During our stay there I have already painted the sunrise, this is the sunset of that day.
We did not see the sun set in the sea, there were the cliffs on the horizon that were hiding the view we hoped for, but the colours of the sky were great.
My husband made a few pictures and today I have painted that scene.

I have chosen to do a 'portrait' format so I could paint a lot of sky. The cliffs are really far away and not much detail was visible in this light and the sea was looking calm so I decided to let these elements be of lesser importance. The clouds  behind the cliffs on the horizon are only suggested here, I remember they were very hazy.

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

Bayeux - the old town

During our short vacation in Normandy (France) we visited the town of Bayeux, mostly because our vacation home was very close to that medieval town.
We did go to see the Tapestry and the Cathedral and walked back to our car by the river Aure that flows through the town. There are two watermills in Bayeux that are still working.

We did have many nice views during our walk in Bayeux, but this one inspired me to paint.
It is quite a change after what I painted before, to do a scene with all those roofs and buildings, but I wanted to paint the colours of the houses we saw in that part of Normandy.

The roofs of the buildings in Bayeux are grey, the colour of slate. The buildings are made with a yellow stone. Even the cathedral has these colours and in the villages we passed we also saw that this stone was used for houses and farms. 

While I was painting this scene I thought I made a wrong choice more than once, because this was not easy. Mostly because the scene is not what I usually paint and also a bit because I was not having ideal painting conditions like I have in my little studio at home. 
In short, this was a fight - with myself, the paper, the paint, the subject, etc.
When I was about to give up, my husband said the painting is nice and I should have a rest and a cup of coffee. That helped.

This watercolour painting is not about the architecture of Old Bayeux, but about how it feels to walk there between those yellow stone buildings by the river Aure and I think I managed to paint that - even though it was not easy to do so.

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

Port-en-Bessin, seaview

Our short stay in Normandy (France) had one bright sunny day and we used that to walk towards the village of Port-en-Bessin, walk around the small harbour and enjoy the view towards the sea and the coastline.
We could walk on the jetty that shelters the harbour and we had great views, helped by the sunshine. There were no clouds and no fog that day - only a bit in the morning.

We made lots of pictures again and I chose this view towards the west - with the chalk cliffs, the sea and the beach covered with seaweed for a mixed media work.

The underpainting is in different shades of blue watercolour and the cliffs and beach are in watersoluble pencils.

This was another 'experiment' for me, trying out my materials and finding out how I really love to use them. This certainly was fun to do and I will probably do more in this technique - someday.

The details about paper, paint, pencils, size etc can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

Normandy - sunrise

 

Last week, in Normandy, we had a vacation home with views on lawns and a golf court, which means lots of grass on all sides. The view on the little church was on the front side of the house, this is the back side.
The first morning I was awake and dressed (it is cold outside in the mornings) in time to make some pictures of the sunrise.

The view is showing the lawns and golf court I mentioned earlier and the apple trees that were everywhere. This is Normandy and there are apple trees wherever you look, to produce all that cider, Pommeau and Calvados for which this region is famous.

I have chosen to make a small size watercolour, just to show the colours of the sunrise and the remainder of the morning fog that could be seen just above the grass and between the trees.

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

Église St Pierre, Port-en-Bessin - evening mood

Last week we (my husband and me) were in Port-en-Bessin, on the coast of Normandy (France). We had found a nice vacation home there and we could see the little church of St Pierre just across the lawn in front of the parking place. 
The first evening we were in need of a walk, after two days in the car so we made use of the good weather and walked towards the church, made some (reference) pictures and walked some more streets in the direct surroundings of our vacation home.
We returned after sunset, in the last light of the evening.

There were some nice dark clouds when we were outside and they did give the church and its tower a great background. Because it was really late and the light in the house was not great to paint by (a bit yellowish), I decided to make a charcoal drawing. That does not give any problems with colour matching so the shade of the light did not really matter.

Of course, in broad daylight the church does have a foundation, a churchyard with a fence, a house nearby and some trees behind it, but this evening, with night falling, dark clouds and a hint of fog on the ground there was an air of mystery that I wanted to capture in my drawing.

There are some more pictures of this little church, so maybe one day I will make a more detailed painting.

The details about size, paper, availability and contact information can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com