Siberian Tiger - a Conté drawing

 

Last weekend we visited the 'Dierenpark Amersfoort' and had a great time. 

At some point in the main route we saw this Siberian tiger, that walked towards the large window where  lots of children and adults were watching. Close to the large window the tiger laid down as if it was posing for pictures. My husband had the camera and made pictures for me.

Today I found time to make a drawing, using my Conté Crayons because these have the best colours for the tiger. To get the best result for the orange-ish fur I had to mix some colours but that is the fun of working with a limited set of colours.

This time I added more white after a first spray with fixative, to make it stand out even more. Of course I used my fixative again after that. This technique is something I have seen in a tutorial and I use it when I think I need it.

The information about the materials I have used, the size and availability of this work and - if you are interested in my original artwork - my contact information can all be found in my Flickr account.

Bindweed (Calystegia sepium) - a pencil drawing

 

These days the bindweed (Calystegia sepium) shows its white flowers everywhere in our neighbourhood and I made some reference pictures for a drawing.

Using my Drawing Pencils I had to find a way to show that the white of the flower is not so very white at all. Using light colours I shaped the flower and added the darker background later.

The colours of the flower are created by the shadows in the petals and the light on them. Not to forget the reflected colours of the grasses around it.

The information about the materials I have used, the size and availability of this drawing and - if you are interested in my original artwork - my contact information can all be found in my Flickr account.

Parc Vordenstein

 

Last summer we (my husband and me) went for a walk in Park Vordenstein in Belgium. The parc is on an estate and has nice paths for walking, woodland areas, fields, a pond and a small corner with cattle. After the walk there is the Orangery for coffee, tea or a lunch. We had a nice day.

Of course I made several reference pictures for later use and I did not do much with these until today. In one of the woodland areas we saw these two dead trees - there really are two of them, the smallest one is almost hidden in the background.

Of course I could make a charcoal drawing or a Conté drawing of the dead trees, but in this case I wanted to make a watercolour painting. They stand in the green bushes with green and 'red' trees in the background and I liked the difference.

For this painting I used some colours that are new for me and the sunlight on the leaves of the bushes is suggested by using fine salt on the wet (damp) paint.

I am happy with the result. The new shades of green are nice to work with and the salt did what I hoped it would do.

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

Feather - a Conté drawing

 

Last summer my husband Peter made a nice picture of a lonely feather on the beach. During my painting vacation we discussed the possibilities of this reference picture for making a painting with an 'unexpected addition' and decided I was to paint another composition.

A few days ago the Sketch A Day app had the prompt 'feather' and I immediately decided to use the reference picture my husband made. 

That picture was used for this Conté drawing, showing only the sand, the feather and its shadow.

Maybe I will try other compositions with the feather, trying to find the best 'unexpected addition'.

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

Pumpkin Field 2

 

That one reference picture I made of the pumpkin field (when I was on my painting vacation, during a short evening walk) has potential for more than one composition.

For this painting I selected an area with a lot of leaves and some (almost hidden) pumpkins and made a watercolour painting that is all about those large leaves. 

On the background I started drawing the leaves and pumpkins until I thought the composition was nice. Painting these leaves, their stems and the pumpkins was next. 

For all the shades of green I mixed different colours into a 'green from the tube' and the result really pleases me.

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

Water tower at the 'Spoorwegmuseum' - Conté drawing

 

This week we went to visit the 'Spoorwegmuseum' in the town of Utrecht and we were in the company of the grandchildren, their parents (of course!) and two guest children from France. The museum has many locomotives, trains, wagons and other material that has once moved over the rails in The Netherlands. 

Besides these there are also lots of information and modern trains - as a model - a simulator, some old rails and a workplace from the steam age.

That workplace shows the building as it was - we cannot really enter it, but we can look - and part of that is this old rusty water tower that inspired me to make this drawing.

This time I have also used Conté pencils, both for the colours and for the lines.

Because I was relatively far away from my subject when I made my reference picture, the building is not as detailed as it might be but as the water tower is my subject that does not really matter to me. Now the building is clearly the structure that has the tower on its roof.

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

Twins

 

A few weeks ago we went for a nice signposted walk in the 'Mastenbos' (Belgium) where I made several reference pictures of trees, dead or alive. These birch trees are very alive and I really wanted to paint these.

The July challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken' is about a favourite place in summertime. My favourite places in any season are the forest (for a walk) and behind my panting table or easel to paint. I thought this work combines both as it is a painting I made after I had a nice walk in a forest.

These twin birch trees were really very close together and I made more than one reference picture to select the nicest one for a painting.

I enjoyed painting these trees and the result is what I hoped it would be.

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

Beech tree bark

 

During my painting vacation I made several reference pictures of trees and tree bark hoping I could use them that same week. One of the pictures is of a beech tree that had several dark spots at eye level (my eyes) so I made the picture. When looking at my pictures our teacher and coach Ad van Aart suggested I would make a watercolour painting of that part of the tree including a bit of the background. 

So I tried to do that, on the hottest afternoon of the month. Of course I failed being too tired with the heat and humidity and my paper (I selected Grain Torchon) would not dry because of that same humidity. At last I gave up and when I did show the work everyone mistook the tree for a birch, the tree trunk was too light and the dark spots were too dark, as you can see below.

As I wanted to paint the beech tree, I tried again at home on Grain Fin paper and I started differently. Now I succeeded to make it look like a beech tree. 

This tree stands in the shadow of other, large trees all the time and did not grow upright. 

The tree bark is dark grey with patches of green that are caused by some algae growing on the tree bark. The dark spots are not all dark brown (my mistake in the first version) but just darker grey with a touch of the green I mentioned. For this version I also changed the composition a bit, the left side of the tree - with some extra dark structures - is now visible so the structure of the tree trunk is more comprehensible.

The second painting (the one above) is what I hoped for. Beech trees do not have a very structured bark and this is the best I could do.

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

View on Dordrecht from Papendrecht (The Netherlands) made during a workshop session

 

The 'Teekengenootschap Pictura' from Dordrecht is 250 years old and that is celebrated with different activities. One of these activities is a series of workshops about drawing during the summer months. I have attended the first one and now also the last one. (the two in the middle were either booked full or inot possible to attend for me).

This one was all about the View on Dordrecht from my home village/town, Papendrecht. Following the Old Masters, we were to make a charcoal drawing of a view on Dordrecht preferably featuring the iconic buildings like the 'Grootshoofdspoort', the 'Grote Kerk' (big church) and less old, the railway bridge between Dordrecht and Zwijndrecht.

Because the weather forecast was not so great, we were on the terrain of the marina where we could go indoors if needed. So we did not have the 'classic' views of Cuyp, Willaerts and many more, but the view we had was still worth drawing.

We had a large sheet of paper and I folded it in two, so I could make two drawings on one sheet - and the smaller size did feel more comfortable to me as well.

The weather still was not bright, dark clouds were above us almost all the time and that can be seen in mu drawings. We were behind a row of bushes and these can also be seen in my drawings. The river was mostly behind these bushes and the view was limited, but I decided on two 'looking directions' that would give a view on Dordrecht.

The second, portrait format drawing is more a view on the 'Drierivierenpunt' (three rivers point) with the Water Tower of Zwijndrecht in view and the ferry from Papendrecht to Dordrecht waiting for its time to go.

Both drawings are to be seen in the Library of Papendrecht after September 26th in the exhibition of the works that were made during the workshop.

The information about the materials I have used, the size of these drawings and their availability can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Storm coming - two paintings, one storm

 

In the middle of our painting week a storm was expected in the evening. Thunder and rain were predicted and we sat at the dinner table when suddenly the wind started (what a relief from the warm and damp day) and dark clouds were coming in.

Most of us (painters) stepped away from the building to make pictures of these beautiful clouds and of course I did that as well.

The clouds were very dark but there were also bright spots of light, our pictures are really inspiring. In fact there was not much rain, just a few drops (there was more the next day) and even though we could hear thunder, the lightning was above the lowest clouds.

Of course I used my most impressive picture as my reference the next morning, painting on a large sheet of watercolour paper with a dark colour mixture that should result in dark grey or even black.

The painting is made with the picture as my guideline, but as our teacher and coach Ad van Aart always says, the picture may have inspired to make a painting, but the art happens on the paper. The painting almost painted itself, using my hands as a tool and I know that trying to correct what happened would have spoiled the whole image.

The result is even better than I hoped for.

After the first painting happened so easily and in very short time, I decided to try a second one, on a smaller sheet of paper, using a different kind of paint. This paint is made with two pigments and I hoped it would give me a nice stormy sky.

Unfortunately that did not go as I wished for. This paint works in one layer and adding more does not give me the possibility to make some areas darker. As I work on a tilted surface (both in my studio on a drawing table and on my field easel) the water that runs down the paper slowly takes the paint with it to the lowest point.

Finally I asked Ad van Aart for help, as this would never become a nice dark clouded sky and I was getting a bit tired. The suggestion he made was to let the painting dry and start drawing on it with charcoal or another drawing material. I decided on charcoal and started drawing in the dark parts of the clouds, using my fingers and a piece of eraser to get the result I wanted.

There was one last surprise, after using fixative for the charcoal, the blue pigment from the paint resurfaced a little and that gave just a bit more depth to the final result.

After all this I am really happy with both works, the watercolour that went so smoothly and the experiment that turned out great after I used charcoal.

The information about the materials I used in both works can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

If you are interested in my original artwork, please contact me.

 

Sequoia

 

Very close to our location, on the grounds of a hotel, is a sequoia tree. Last year I painted the tree bark, this year I wanted to paint the whole tree. After making my reference picture our teacher and coach Ad van Aart and me decided on the composition of the painting.

It really helped that I had bought a block of 'panorama' paper that can of course also be used for large trees.

Painting this tree was a nice challenge and I really enjoyed it. The result is what I hoped for.

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.

Pendulum with shells - a watercolour painting

 

The drawing of the little pendulum with shells I made 'en plein air' in a nice garden last week inspired me to a watercolour painting. Using the drawing as my reference I made a painting with a bit more colour in the background, just like I sometimes do when painting flowers or mushrooms.

My palette is different from the landscapes or my tree scenes, I wanted to use the pinks I have for this painting. 

The dimensions of the paper are just right for this pendulum and I enjoyed painting it.

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

Along the high tide line

 

The reference picture for this watercolour painting has been waiting a long time before I used it and I only did that now because of the August challenge of 'Goed Gezien - Goed Bekeken'. The theme is 'along the high tide line' and this is about as close to a high tide line as you can get.

Of course the high tide was some hours ago at the moment the picture was taken, but where the water has been is still visible. This was at the beach at the Maasvlakte, just before sunset, three years ago. Of course I would have painted this scene in the near future, but the challenge made me paint now.

The reference picture was made from a low angle, just above the sand - avoiding to get wet but as low as I could get. This makes the light on the water a bit more special.

The details on the foreground - shells and the footsteps of seabirds - are only suggested, not every detail made it into the painting.

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

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.

Calla - in my garden

 

A few years ago I bought a Calla plant for my mother, for inside her home. Unfortunately I had forgotten that this plant is not healthy for her cat, so it moved to my home and after the flower died, it moved to my garden.  Every year the leaves emerged and died again in winter but it took all these years for the plant to bloom again. Of course we made several pictures and one of the pictures my husband made is the reference for this watercolour painting.

For this painting I selected a small sheet of paper, only one flower that is my subject, so that does not need a big sheet of paper. Especially not in this moist summer heat, when the paper does not dry as quickly as I would like it to. A large size painting would have been more of a struggle than a nice, calming afternoon in my studio.

The result is what I hoped it would be and 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.

Tree roots 3 - a watercolour painting and a study

 

The last result of my painting vacation. This scene proved to be very challenging to make a good charcoal study, the charcoal is not as subtle as the watercolour.

Our teacher and coach Ad van Aart encouraged me to use the reference picture for this watercolour, a very grey looking scene with sand, some tree roots and just a few other elements in it. The roots had the same shade of grey as the sand, this was a very open path, too well-travelled for any mosses to grow or dead leaves to stay in place. Only the tree roots in the foreground showed some brown. 

For the reference picture I kneeled down as low as possible (I had to get up again without embarassing either myself or my husband who was with me on that walk) so the shadows of the roots on the ground were very strong.

The composition is mostly decided by the darkness of the shadows.

For the watercolour painting I painted the background first and after that had dried I started to paint the lines of the tree roots, using as little paint as possible. The dark shadows were painted as dark as possible. Some of the gathered bits of wood on the right side of the large root and some large shadow areas (clouds or other trees) were painted and after that the composition was perfected with more shadows and more areas that might contain smaller branches.

The study was helpful for the placement of these areas, but I did not copy it exactly

As you can see, the charcoal study is much darker than the watercolour painting, giving more contrast in the lines, which was not what I wanted for the painting.

The painting is even better than I hoped for, thanks to the helpful comments of Ad van Aart.

The information about the materials I have used for the watercolour painting and the charcoal study can all be found in my Tumblr blog. There you can also find information about the sizes and availabilities.

Tree roots 2 -watercolour paintings and a charcoal study

 

During my painting vacation I wanted to focus on the structures made by tree roots, visible on well-travelled sand paths. For this I made several reference pictures and this scene is the second we picked to work from. The reference pictures were chosen by our teacher and coach, Ad van Aart, together with me. Compared to the first one, this reference picture offered more and different challenges for me as an artist.

After I had made the charcoal study

the composition of the watercolour painting was decided. In this case I had to fill the whole sheet of watercolour paper with the composition of the drawing, not leaving extra white areas.

For the painting I worked on dry paper, leaving the lines of the roots untouched. The mosses and grasses were painted and the shadows on the forest floor were painted using darker mixes than the sunlit spots on the top left.

After these first layers were painted, the shadows on the tree roots were painted and after that was decided that it was a good idea to indicate the structures of the roots as well.

A second painting was to be made, with a more 'dramatic' atmosphere than the first one.

To make a painting look more dramatic, a monochromatic painting always works good. For this one I decided to use Indigo, because of the possibility to work from very light to really dark. Again I worked on dry paper, leaving the structures of the roots untouched. The shadows of the roots on the forest floor were painted and the shadows on the roots themselves, where they crossed, were also indicated.

This painting is much more abstract than the other ones I had made this week. One of the other painters liked it so much that the painting was sold.

The information about the materials I have used for the watercolour paintings and the charcoal study, their sizes and availabilities can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Tree roots 1 - Watercolour and charcoal study

 

For this painting vacation I planned to make watercolour paintings inspired by the patterns of tree roots in the paths we take when walking in the forests. We always use signposted walks, so the paths are very well travelled. Several reference pictures were made during our last walk in 'De Soesterduinen'.

Our teacher and coach Ad van Aart helped me to select the reference pictures I was to work from this week and this one is the first. They get more difficult after this one, although tis also was a nice challenge.

After I made the charcoal study

we decided that the composition was good, so the watercolour painting had to be placed on the paper in the same proportions. The initial sketch on the watercolour paper took some time, but painting was relatively easy. During the painting process we decided on adding the shadows of the roots and some more patches of green, to complement the green moss in the top left corner. In this way the painting is not really abstract, but the result works very well.

The information about the materials I have used, the sizes of the watercolour painting and the charcoal drawing and their availabilities can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

Sequoia (detail) three paintings and a study

This summer I had my painting week again and out teacher and coach Ad van Aart did send me to a beautiful sequoia tree for my first painting. The tree is too big to paint completely, but I wanted to concentrate on details this summer, in this case the beautiful structured bark.

First I made some reference pictures, then I made a charcoal study:

After that I made the watercolour on top, using the original colours as good as possible. Something went wrong with the composition, the study has the tree placed nicely on the paper, leaving white spaces but the watercolour ended up on the whole paper, the wite spaces at the bottom of the tree were gone. The difference in proportions of the watercolour paper and the paper I use for the study made the mistake possible.

So we decided that I had to make at least one more watercolour painting and I changed the size of the watercolour paper I am using so the composition would be placed better on the paper.

The first watercolour was made using only shades of brown - not the original colours of the cedar tree, but the result is really nice.

For the second watercolour I used a very different idea, I made a monochromatic painting using indigo.

The results are nice, this is mostly done as a series of studies, to compare the effect of different paper sizes, composition and colour schemes.

The information about the materials I have used, the sizes of the study and the watercolours and their availabilities can all be found in my Tumblr blog.

The Dunes at Rockanje (Netherlands)

 

Our North Sea coast is special, but I only learned that when I realised that other coast lines have rocks, cliffs, pebble beaches or..   no sand beach and sand dunes. For me all this sand was 'normal' but now I really appreciate our coast much more.

Last week we were at the beach in Rockanje (The Netherlands) and we started walking from the parking place called 'Tweede Slag'. In the evening the beach is almost empty so it is a nice place for a walk in the wind, we enjoyed the fresh air, the views, the birds and had a great time. 

Of course I made some reference pictures, this time I wanted to paint our dunes - a seascape would be too easy, we had a blue sea and a blue sky with some clouds. The dark bushes, the grasses and the wind-blown shapes of the dunes inspired me.

Because it was getting late and the sun was behind me when I made the picture the plants on top of the dunes were dark, almost back lit. The clouds were getting dark as well. The slope has many shells or remains of shells as the birds nesting there feed on them. There is not really a path, that area is a reserve for the birds. Of course there are grasses growing on the slopes, on the tops there are small bushes.

In my watercolour painting I wanted to depict the height of the sand dunes at that point so I chose a high horizon and a 'portrait' format for my painting. Showing the contrasts between the dark vegetation and the light sand was one of my goals, and I am really happy with the result.

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