Venkantbrug, de Moerputten (The Netherlands)

 

Our walk in Natural Reserve 'De Moerputten' started (and ended) at this bridge, the 'Venkantbrug' or bridge at the side of the fen.

This bridge is part of the abandoned railroad and we had to climb up some stairs to get on the railway embankment (or dyke) for the first part of our walk. 

As we walked towards the bridge, the view of the landscape behind it was beautiful, the colours in the sky were nice, so I asked my husband (who had the camera) to make me a reference picture. At first I wanted to paint only the landscape, but later I decided otherwise.

The landscape is still there and I also indicated the nice pink colours in the sky, but the bridge is very present in my work. For the bridge I also used a line marker to emphasize the difference between the shapes of the landscape (the fen, the trees, the grasses) and the straight lines of the metal bridge.

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

Step by step

The March challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken' is 'Step by step' and I did not want to do the obvious thing.
So I started thinking - what goes step by step? The making of a painting of course and how a child learns to walk, but also the elderly people behind their walkers go step by step, not certain of their balance anymore.
I wanted to make a painting with several walkers parked outside a building where people were having fun with.... something I had to find yet.

For the walkers I made some reference pictures and then I had to find a theme.
Dancing lessons are also step by step, why not combining the walkers with the dancing lessons?  The idea was born, now I had to make a sketch and ask what dance would be the most unexpected to be taught to people that need walkers. The choice was Salsa or Samba and I chose the latter, maybe because salsa is also a name of a sauce ( in cooking).

I have not tried to make a true masterpiece but the scene speaks for itself - I hope.

The details about the materials I used, availability and contact information can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com 

'Dauwtrappen?' - or Treading dew?

The May challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken' is about a memory of mine called 'Dauwtrappen' which can be translated by treading dew.
The custom was - and still is - to rise early on the morning of Ascension Day and walk in the fields and nature while the dew was still there. And be back in time for Church of course.
This year Ascension Day is almost the last day of the month so I have painted my contribution a bit earlier and I will submit it now it is finished.

I have made the scene a bit smaller than groups of people waling the roadsides or the fields and tried to include some dewdrops in my painting.
So I had to paint some grass, dewdrops and someone treading the dew, probably an insect, given the scale I have chosen.

I did study a step-by-step guide in a magazine before I started but the drops in that guide were much larger than mine so I had to adapt the tips and tricks that were given to the size of the painting I was making.

I started out with a drawing, masking the drops and painting the blades of grass. The drops were a bit small and they were not easy for me to paint, but I think I have made something that really gives the impression of dewdrops on the grass.

And then the insects on the blades of grass had to be introduced. In my garden there are a lot of ants, so I added some of these, using a fine line marker and a drop of water.

It took some time to decide what I wanted to paint and then I had to think of how I wanted to paint it, but I really am happy with the results.

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

(How to) Read a book.

The list of suggestions for September 2018 gives 'Read a Book Day' for this day. As you no doubt have already noticed, I do not paint or sketch using every prompt in the list supplied by Doodlewash. I need to be inspired to paint (or draw) before I even start thinking about what I will make for the occasion.
Reading books is one of my passions (besides watercolour painting and cooking) so I wanted to do something with this day. 
Open books with things (gentle or not) coming out of them are a very common theme so I had to do something else. When reading a book I sometimes 'disappear' in the story I am reading so that was to be the theme. And now something that fits my skills....
The idea of diving came up, the diving that is done in a swimming pool and there is no water splashing in all directions but words, or fragments of words.
As I have not been in public swimming pools for years, I had to imagine a structure for the tower that holds the diving board. Photo references on the Internet show many possibilities, so I invented my own. This one is for diving into a good book so there should be no limits.

This time I have used my Watercolour Markers - and a brush with some water - for most of the image and I have added Line markers where I thought they would be needed. 
I am still exploring the possibilities and limitations of these markers and I am not disappointed with the result of this experiment.

The letters are parts of the words 'read a book' in English, Dutch and French.

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

Our chestnut tree in springtime - mixed media

The flower buds I have been drawing have come out of course. (The moment I am writing this, the flowers are all gone and little chestnuts-in-the-making have appeared)
The flowers of my chestnut tree are not the easiest to draw and paint for me, maybe also because I did not climb a ladder to make a close-up picture.
I did want to give it a try so I have made some reference pictures and selected one to work from. I could have chosen one with the flowers nicely back-lit, but that would look very much like my previous drawing and I want to show a bit more of my chestnut tree.

For this drawing I decided to make a watercolour under painting in the colours of the leaves that are fully grown now. With a white pencil I have tried to make the white flowers 'pop out' and that did not work as I hoped it would. So I used white gouache and achieved a result that is much more to my liking.
The leaves are done with different pencils and I have used a line marker for some of the outlines of the leaves, mostly the leaf tips.

This was another experiment getting to know my materials and exercising my drawing skills. I learned that drawing on this paper after I have applied a watercolour under painting is not as easy as drawing on untreated paper. It felt as if the paper 'rejected' some of the pencil marks, especially the watercolour pencils. Maybe I will have better results using a different paper.

More information about this drawing (materials used, size, availability) and the other paintings and drawings I made about my chestnut tree can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com