The little fortified town of Nieuwpoort (Netherlands) has preserved its ramparts in a beautiful manner.
A signposted walk guided me over a part of the highest wall and I really appreciated the view I had of the town on one side and the moat on the other side. Of course there were modern houses, some fields and the river Lek to be seen besides the moat.
This view is towards the old town inside the ramparts. I had found a nice spot with a view on lots of trees, some roofs and a part of the structure of the ramparts.
I decided to make a sketch - like drawing using my Conté Sketching pencils. I have started with the Sepia pencil and have added Sanguine only for the roofs of the buildings and the foliage of the trees and bushes on the foreground.
Of course this is an experiment, as I did not explore the possibilities of the Conté pencils completely. In fact this drawing is part of that exploration.
I have not decided yet whether I will use this sketch/drawing to make a watercolour painting.
More information about this drawing (size, used materials, availability, etc) can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com
Sometimes I feel like doing a scene twice and try out how it looks using different colours or even a different technique. This time I wanted to do a charcoal drawing of the last landscape I painted in watercolour.
In fact this is my second charcoal drawing ever, I learned to appreciate this technique on that painting trip in the Ardennes I mentioned in my previous post.
While making the watercolour I already got acquainted with the scene and that helped me a lot doing this drawing. Here I left out the clouds because they would have interfered with the branches of the trees and the wind that was blowing on that hilltop is easier to visualise because I used a smudging technique to create the foliage on those branches.
Alltogether I am very happy with the results.
More information can be found at www.jannekesatelier.co.nr
I like the idea of trying something new, especially when it's about my art.
This time it's charcoal drawing, something I don't remember having done before.
Looking for a subject I found a weeping ash in a courtyard. The branches were pruned down last year but the tree was doing all the better (I was told). As a result of that work all the curves that had grown in the branches in the previous years were visible.
Those forms really can be intriguing and I decided to select a nice one to draw.
After a first sketch in my sketchbook I started to work with charcoal on a large sheet of paper. While drawing I decided to add some of the leaves that were visible on the tree. After adding some background I was realyy happy with the result.
It was a nice change to be working this way and I will certainly do more charcoal drawings in the (near) future.
More information about this work (size, material) can be found at www.jannekesatelier.co.nr
There is something new in watercolour - world to have fun with: Watercolour Markers!
My daughter gave me a box with 6 colours and I had to try them as soon as possible.
As described in the instructions I found on the internet, they have two tips, a sharp one for precision and a brush type tip for filling in larger spaces.
I tried all that of course, with and without water, with and without added paint.
This is the result of half an hour fun and experimenting - I did not have much more time.
For the subject of my test run I also got inspiration from my daughter: Sakura flowers!
I kept my composition simple so it would be easy to copy, for I wanted to try all those possibilities and compare the results.
This was fun and I will definitely try out more... I like this stuff so: thank you very much Mariska for giving me this box of wonders!
