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
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
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
