The Red lantern

 

The July challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken' had the Red Lantern for its theme. The red lantern is always on the vehicle at the end of a convoy - or the last cyclist in the race gets the red lantern to mark his unfavourable position.

The sports - related explanation of the theme did not inspire me, so I went through the archives and found a picture taken almost nine years ago in a narrow street in France. The lantern was high above us and because of the narrow street the picture had to be made at an unusual angle (for us). There was a very thick fog coming in from the sea which made the reference picture very special.

For my contribution to the challenge I have only looked at the perspective, made some changes to the amount of windows, added some lanterns and only suggested the trees and the fog in the background. 

Usually I try to change my style or technique when I paint or draw for a challenge and that is what I have done again this time. Well, maybe I have done this so often that this has become a 'second style' that is already customary for me.

The initial pencil drawing was coloured in with watercolour and I made sure I used a sketchy style. The paper is not really watercolour paper so I used as little water as possible to distribute the paint. The lanterns and some other details were drawn in using watercolour markers. I have used a little water to let the lines made by these markers flow where needed.

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

(Behind) The fence

A short vacation of only two days in the east of our country is not enough to paint on the spot, but of course the camera was in our luggage and we used it very well again.
As we were with a group of eight, including three generations, we were a bit limited in the choice of walks, excursions and sightseeing tours but we did all have as much fun as possible and I have some great pictures to paint from.

One of the places we saw was the estate of Singraven, although we did not visit the main building as it was closed for public during the weekend. 
There was a nice path for all of us to walk and beside the water mill on the other side of the road is a nice restaurant where the food is great. 

The view towards the main building has some nice wrought iron fences and I have made some pictures of one of them. The fence does not stand in a road or path, it just marks the border of the estate. It ends in the bushes on one side and in a small pond on the other side. The road towards the main entrance of the building is different, with lantern posts and of course there is a road in that scene.
The absence of a road or path is what attracted my attention in this scene.

This painting is composed with the elements I have mentioned, the main building, the grass, bushes, a small pond close to the building, branches of a nearby tree hanging over  and the fence. 
The scene is almost imaginary and I have tried to paint the atmosphere of the evening of a nice day in springtime, when the light starts to fade away and the view grows a bit misty.

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

View on the Town Hall of Nieuwpoort

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 

On the canal - made for a contest

One of the magazines I have subscribed to, "Plaisirs de Peindre" is celebrating its 20th birthday with a contest for all subscribers. At the cost of a small fee we can download twenty sketches that were published before in the magazine. One of those sketches has to be the inspiration for a work of art. Each sketch already has an example of a painting that has been made and published in the magazine.

Amongst a lot of still life and flowery sketches this little landscape attracted my attention. 
Being free to 'translate' the initial sketch to an artwork of my own I decided on a winter scene using only three colours. 

The final date for submission is past, so now I am publishing my work. (Of course I did submit in time!) 
The contest goes on, the next issue will hold the same call for entries, only there will be different sketches available to paint or draw our works of art. I am really looking forward to that!

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

It's time for winter paintings!

Winter will be here soon and with that comes the question about the Christmas Cards of this year. So I start to search the paintings I made last year for a candidate, sometimes with success, this time not. I have painted some nice foggy winter landscapes, but those are not suitable for Christmas Cards.
That meant that I had to paint a suitable winter scene from fantasy. For inspiration I asked my daughter for some guidelines and after her reply I had to start searching for images of gatehouses. Of course I found nothing I could use directly, many gatehouses are not what I was looking for. 

After some thinking this is what appeared in my sketch-book: some small buildings with a gate and a wall, a lane towards the gate and the suggestion of the continuing of that lane behind the wall, snow and lights in one of the buildings and a very small lantern by the gate.
For the colours I started with sepia but gradually I added more for the lights, the roofs and doors. And the shadows on the snow of course. And I added a small shrub of holly close to the building on the right. Look well, it really is there!

At first I was not satisfied with this painting, thinking the outlines of the buildings should be more defined. But looking at it a few days later the scene good as it is. In winter the world can be very grey and everything looks a bit dim on those days. The colour I used for the sky suggest one of those grey days so it is not necessary to alter the outlines of the  buildings.
So I decided to listen to my painting and not change a thing. 

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

On the road - in the Ardennes

We drove through the Ardennes and came upon this nice scene. 
A railroad, a little building, bushes, grasses, trees and the mountains in the background.
All in autumn colours, waiting to be sketched. I also took some reference pictures, but never used them.

I wanted to make a charcoal drawing inspired by this scene, but only black and white would take away the friendly feeling. So I made an under-painting with watercolour in autumn colours. The watercolour paper has a nice structure to work on with charcoal.
The result of the under-painting will always be a bit of a surprise. This time there was a nice surprise to work with.

This is a small size painting, I brought only smaller sizes of paper with me on vacation.
When I am painting in the 'vacation home' I don't have the same amount of space I have in my studio. And I have to be careful with the furniture in that place as it is not mine.
That is why I choose the small sizes, they are easier to manage in such circumstances.

More information about this painting can be found at my website: www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

Castle 'Keukenhof'

The castle 'Keukenhof' was built in 1642 and was restored several times. The last restoration ended only four years ago and now the building can be visited.
The name 'Keukenhof' means 'kitchen garden' and the surrounding estate was meant to produce the vegetables, fruits, game, eggs and all other things needed to feed the inhabitants of the castle.
The estate is now used for festivals, such as Castle Fest in August and a Christmas Fair in December. The park around the castle building is a nice place to walk and find surprising views.

During Castle Fest there are lots of people on the grounds and it is hard to get a nice picture of the lanes, the fields and the flowers. But I managed to get a spot to draw the castle! Of course this is only part of the building, there were some large trees blocking the view but I don't really mind drawing the castle like this.

More information about this charcoal drawing can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

Looking for a blue sky

For this watercolour I got inspired by a photo my daughter Mariska made. There was something interesting about the abandoned building and the holes through which the blue sky was visible. But before this painting was finished, I had to do a lot of thinking and I had to make some changes.
First of all I had not seen the place. The photo was showing a little piece of building with parts of walls almost everywhere. As it was really sunlit, there was no shadow or perspective to reveal te actual structure. So I 'took down' another wall and simplified the part of the building I was going to paint.
Second was the decay. I like to exaggerate that a little, letting plants grow over walls and through windows. And yet I had painted so many green vines over the last weeks that I wanted a change. Autumn maybe? With yellow, red and orange for my foliage. 
So that was the plan!
I started painting the sky and the walls and planned to fill in the plants after that. When the walls were dry, I started to paint the vines on the left and at that moment I decided it was already winter in my painting. So there are some leaves left on the vines and on the branches of the tree we see through the door opening, but they are painted with the same colours  the vines and branches have.

More information about this watercolour (size, colours used, etc.) can be found at www.jannekesatelier.co.nr