Aquarellista!

Exhibition MyDNA aquarelles in Nice

2012-01-29T14:17:00.003+01:00

Until 1 February 2012, Marina shows an overview of her latest aquarelles in the hippest gallery of the Côte d’Azur, Galerie Oscar in Nice. The theme of this solo exhibition is ‘the mystery of survival’, referring to DNA, cells, fingerprints, portraits and other unique aspects of life that determine a person’s survival and are omnipresent in Marina’s work. The aquarelles are painted with Winsor and Newton on hand made paper, which absorbs the transparent paint in a different way. This makes the repair of mistakes absolutely impossible, but also makes the colours come out much stronger – an effect I love!

Galerie Oscar is a galerie for contemporary, modern art. They work in an original and different way with their artists and for example regularly have events around the art, with speakers, music and great food. They also organize yoga classes in the mornings and arrange art rentals.

You can visit the exhibition and Galerie Oscar on 9 Rue Fodéré, 06300 NICE
For more information visit http://www.galerieoscar.com

After 1 February the gallery is opened for private viewings, you'll have to contact them if you want to visit

2011-12-31T21:07:00.000+01:00

A VERY HAPPY, VIBRANT & CREATIVE NEW YEAR

TO ALL OF YOU!!

The Grand Prix d'Aquarelle 2011

2011-11-19T22:10:00.001+01:00

McRose 13, Marina Kulik.

90x70 cm, Aquarelle on handmade paper

Out of hundreds of entries, the paintings of Cathie van der Stel, Brenda Moorehouse and myself, were chosen as finalists of the Grand Prix d’Aquarelle. The work is exhibited in The Culture house of Meise until 20 November. Three of our paintings received a honorary mention and I am proud as well as delighted to say that my aquarelle 'Farewell' has won the prize of the Culture Council!

The Grand Prix d’Aquarelle 2011 was an interesting contest, with a theme that Cathie, Brenda and I found appealing: ‘Roses without thorns’. There were strict rules, the work should be made specifically for this Grand Prix, and it was not permitted to show it anywhere else before it was judged. So here they are finally!

Rose without thorns, Cathie van der Stel

50x40cm, aquarelle on torchon

Brenda's Rose without a thorn by Brenda Moorehouse

40x50cm, Aquarelle on torchon

Farewell, Marina Kulik

50x70cm aquarelle on Arche torchon

The title is ‘Farewell’ because I painted it like the roses we dropped in the water of the North Sea, after we scattered the ashes of a dear friend. And it also has as a subtitle ’Such roses do not exist, but you can hide the thorns’. Hence the ribbon around it. I am very happy with this acknowledgement!

Gallery commissions - and pricing your Artwork

2011-10-29T00:37:00.001+02:00

The other day I ran into an interesting piece by Barbara Joy Smit, Art Agent. Although her article is written from the 'gallery side', I could relate to it and wanted to share it with you (although it is not specifically about aquarelle) because I think it's always good to be reminded that even artists should sometimes think businesslike!
But - the article is in Dutch. Barbara gave me permission to use it anyway - so here's the gist.

And click here for the original article.

As you probably know, galleries usually*) ask a commission for every artwork they sell. And often, artists add the amount of the commission to 'their' price.

But maybe that is not such a good idea after all:

A client, who has seen your work in a show, contacts you because he is interested to buy - and likes to know your price, or if you are interested to give a discount. The client comes to you, it is his initiative, so you don't have an obligation towards the gallery... or do you? Or - the client buys a piece in a gallery and later visits your atelier and sees similar work for much lower prices. Or talks to a direct client of you who paid much less... Painful! Won't make anybody feel good.

Now a gallery is a commercial company and they want to make a profit, so they ask a commission. Your own price is probably roughly based on materials and hours, but you haven't included commission because up to now you have sold directly to your clients. If the gallery's percentage is deducted from your price there's not enough left!

Likely your message to the gallery will be: the commission is going to be added.

OK - ask yourself: how much have you invested in marketing to sell your work? What does your work space cost, do you have a website, do you participate in tradeshows, do you have a portfolio, flyers, business cards? These are costs that you have probably paid out of your 'hours'. You have paid for them yourself but it actually makes more (business) sense to make these costs part of the sales price.

As a professional artist you are also an entrepreneur. Look at a loaf of bread you buy, you don't just pay for the ingredients and the baker's salary, there's also a calculation of the bakery's rent, the delivery car, the write-offs of the ovens, the insurance, the accountant etc etc... everything is included in the price of your bread. If a baker does it, why shouldn't you?

You should incorporate your business cost, the money you pay in order to create and sell your work, in your price - and when you outsource the marketing and sales of your work to a gallery, they make these costs. So it's actually logic to give that part to the gallery. Which by the way doesn't mean that you can't negotiate!

When you sell your work through a gallery, you actually hire them, which makes you responsible for the cost. And when a client comes to you, he will pay the same price. No difference where he buys your creation. Do you see the added value of exhibiting in a gallery? Then follow the advice - keep your sales prices the same everywhere!

The world of art is small. Being loyal towards your galleries is very important. Going behind the back of the gallery with one of his clients can really harm your reputation. It may bring in a bit of extra money on the short term, but it can also really damage your relationship with an interesting point of sales...

Of course you can deal with clients yourself. But do the right thing. If the client came through the gallery, contact them and thus build on a worthwhile relationship.

Last but not least, price consistency is easier! If you keep your prices the same everywhere, you create stability in 'your' market and you don't have to keep track, you can put prices on your website and in your flyers. And - it's just more professional.

*) there are also galleries who ask a fixed sum upfront. They are called ‘Vanity Galleries’ because usually they have no selection and everybody can show there, and sales have no influence on their income. Journalists and art critics take these galleries less serious, which doesn’t mean that you cannot use them!

Wendy Artin - Master Aquarellista

2011-10-10T22:24:00.001+02:00

Moto Guzzi by Wendy Artin

Highly recommended, this wonderful artist: Wendy Artin. She paints with sepia and watercolours, and uses 'traditional' subjects, models, statues, still life and the daily life in Rome (where she lives and works) yet the way she paints their light make them very 'new' and contemporary!

'Ape with red stripes' by Wendy Artin

Wendy reduces what she sees to just the essential light and dark and the result is - well - breathtaking...

Piazza di popolo by Wendy Artin

Wendy works from the real thing, for a picture like this...

Roman Forum by Wendy Artin

... she goes back to that same spot several days in a row - to go on when the light is approximately the same as when she started...

'Laura' by Wendy Artin

'Tamara' by Wendy Artin - 2009

From her models she makes lots and lots of paintings, working very fast, and she only keeps the really good ones.

Visiting her website you can see a short film with and about her, note that she says (on 2.10 in the timeline) 'I just tear them up and throw them away'. (That's about the ones she is not happy with.) See, other people say it too...!

Have a long look for yourself, visiting http://www.wendyartin.com

ENJOY!!!

Aquarellistas exhibition 'le Village'

2011-09-17T23:53:00.003+02:00

From Saturday 17 - Friday 23 September, 7 aquarellistas show their impressions of ‘le Village’, in aquarelle watercolours in Gallery Casablù, Rue Eugène Giraud in Valbonne.

The aquarellistas are Anna Karin Fast, Brenda Moorhouse, Cathie van der Stel, Edith Alborni, Marina Kulik, Marina Teding van Berkhout, Sandra Seymour Dale

They work together in atelier des beaux arts 'Le Hangar' and for this exhibition each created a number of aquarelles, inspired by the villages in the South of France.

The paintings are absolutely wonderful, it is more than worthwhile to pass by and have a look if you happen to be in the neighbourhood! The galerie is open from 10am - 6pm...

Before...

And After... Cathie van der Stel and Anna Karin Fast's aquarelles make a good combination!

More pictures will follow...

Excuses and apologies

2011-08-05T21:47:00.001+02:00

Rosebud, aquarelle on handmade paper

It is almost 2 months ago that I posted for the last time. I am ashamed! But there are reasons, one is that I am posting a lot on the 'Hangar News' blog, the insider magazine of the atelier I work for. The other reason is that I have been ultra busy making money. No time for contemplating artisthood, or saying more or less wise things about art: during the day I was teaching and painting commissions, and during the night I did all the other things one needs to do, household, social, emails, sleep - And I have been working on a couple of non-commission paintings but they are for the Grand Prix d'aquarelle and cannot be published before they are judged, so! I hope this makes you understand why it's been so silent... Below two contemporary portraits for the September modern art exhibition in Villefranche and up there a small multicolour rose. The connection between these paintings is that they are all painted with Winsor&Newton aquarelle paint on thick handmade paper. As you can see it absorbs and the colours are very dark and contrasting...

Portrait of artist Catherine Earle, on her hand-painted prize-winning chair

Portrait of Jeroen Zaat

Being an artist

2011-06-08T23:49:00.002+02:00

As promised some time ago, I am going to throw some thoughts at you, hoping for a reaction, you may not at all agree, that would be interesting!!

I have been thinking a lot lately about my 'job', and the role of artists in general in society nowadays.

Things have changed since let's say the 19th century. Before that, artists used to be important because they made the memories, the impressions of the times and lives- in other words, they created records of their days and of the 'interesting' people. Something we nowadays have photo's and movies and television and internet for. 'We' being everybody in the whole world...

Because of photographs and other recording media, artists got their chance to move on, experiment, create abstracts, develop a whole new image-language and add lots of interesting things, like personality, impressionism, expressionism, engagement, conceptual thinking to their work.

A wonderful development - and still a record of the time we live in!

But there is also the 'artist as a person' that I think plays a role in nowadays society.

The artist (I take myself as an example here) doesn't have a responsible job.

She is doing all day what she likes best in the whole world and that is painting her favourite subjects, with her favourite materials.

She is also thinking about painting, about art in general, contemplating things like the above, developing new insights, struggling to get a portrait done, having so many ideas and not enough time to execute them all.

Artists can be alcoholics, drug addicts, mentally ill and obsessed, depressed souls, but believe me, they enjoy even that! And their audience can have a piece of the action by looking at their work.

We, the artists, can afford to be the children (or the cats, or the crazy people) of our society. We don't conform to the daily rules of when to get up, sleep or work. And we get away with it. We can have the fun or the weird experiences FOR the other people with the responsible jobs and the hard lives, we can share a piece of our world with them. We can follow up on silly ideas, or on our enormously large dramatic engagement and after expressing that in a work of art we make others feel what the other life can be...

We may not be able to afford a decent car - but we can afford to live a free lifestyle, look different, be different. We get away with almost everything because we're artists!

I know I belong to the category of 'happy' people and I am sure it has to do with aquarelle one way or another (I feel another post coming up!) Although I have no money and have to 'work' very hard to make ends meet, I am always positive - and optimistic- about life in general, where it's going with the world, and about the 'good' in people. And I do know that that shines through in my work, especially the work 'from the insides of my eyeballs', the abstracts, the DNA and the planets (but also in the the portraits, the houses, the roses and the animals...)

With my (sur-)realistic and figurative work I try to make you see the beauty and mystery that I see in the world around me... and with my abstract work, I try to map what's there in my brain - the things you see right before you fall asleep, the things you imagine in the inside of your cells, what a guitar solo looks like, in colours, in rhythm, in shapes... And aquarelle, because of its characteristics and the non- controllable aspect of the paint, made me do it!

Perspective (in aquarelle)

2011-05-05T22:39:00.004+02:00

As promised in our Hangar blog, here's a theory bit about perspective. Not technical, but intuitive, the way we aquarellistas like it!
First of all - your horizon is always on eye-level and your brain knows exactly what 'horizontal' is: if you hold a pen 'horizontally' in front of you, it is perfectly level. (you know how to hang a painting straight etc etc...) The proof that your brain knows this is in the picture below: you can tell which ones are the children... why - how?

You can change the expression of your painting with the level of your horizon. There is a 'normal' viewpoint, but you can also work from a very low horizon - expressing that you are very small, everything is higher than you, you are in awe of your surroundings - the frog view

example of 'Frog view' (thanks to Krijn Dijkema for the picture)

or a high horizon - so that everything is below you...

example of 'bird view'

Another important thing that suggests distance is that the 'objects' (mountains, a village, a tree, houses) which are further away, are 'bluer' (simple: air is blue, the further away the object is, the more air between you and the object).

Example of distant objects that are more and more blue: Venice by William Turner

Next important thing - the bigger the distance the smaller an object is. Which leads to something called vanishing points... These are helpful when you are painting buildings. In 2D (your flat piece of paper) horizontal stays horizontal, and vertical stays vertical... the problem is the angles... objects that are further away are smaller and this also works for walls (the further a certain part of the wall is from you, the smaller it is). To draw or paint that consistently you can use so-called vanishing points, on your horizon.

If the walls of this house were endlessly long, they would go on up to the horizon.

That is where your vanishing points are...

And of course the most important: keep observing carefully, measure, check and compare - the best example is always in what you are seeing!

Aquarelle & humor

2011-04-28T10:37:00.001+02:00

You can expect a couple of solemn posts here in the near future! I am contemplating stuff: why am I an artist, what is art, why is aquarelle my medium of choice… Serious business!

Parrot - copyright Jan WC

But I want to keep the Aquarellista blog entertaining at the same time – so here's a fun story

Famous WaterColourist Jan WC wanted to paint a parrot and happened to run into a guy who had one for sale, for a reasonable price. Jan figured that it would be nice to have the bird as company in his atelier and bought him. The parrot was fully grown and turned out to have a bad attitude - and worse vocabulary. Every word he spoke was rude. Jan tried hard to change the bird's attitude and tried to teach him polite words, playing soft music, anything he could think of to try and set a good example.

Nothing worked.

He yelled at the bird and the bird yelled back. He tried everything he could think of, but the bird just got more angry and more rude. When a rich and refined client was visiting to check out a portrait, Jan, in a moment of desperation, put the parrot in the fridge.

For a few moments he heard the bird squawk and kick and scream - then suddenly, there was quiet. Not a sound. As soon as his client had left, Jan quickly opened the fridge's door, worried that the bird was somehow hurt...

The parrot was fine! He calmly stepped out onto Jan's extended arm and said, "I believe I may have offended you with my rude language and actions. I will endeavour at once to correct my behavior. I really am truly sorry and beg your forgiveness."

Jan was astonished at the bird's change and was about to ask what had made such a dramatic change when the parrot continued, clearing his throat: "May I ask what the chicken did?"

Don't ask them to be groovy

2011-04-18T22:56:00.000+02:00

This is the last part of a series of aquarellista-blog reactions on the article in the Sunday Times that said:

Although I mostly agree to what Waldemar states in the article, this groovy business just goes too far. First challenge of course - "define groovy"...

Is groovy (in art) something that is reserved to insane artists, related with drama and passion and throwing paint (and other stuff) on the canvas? (or in our case paper)

Is groovy conceptual, visionary, or original (as in 'new', never done before)

Because although all of the above can be done -and is actually done- in watercolours, all over the world, I must agree that aquarelle watercolours as a technique, in itself asks for another approach.

Joseph Zbukvic - Master Watercolourist from Zagreb

As Joseph Zbukvic says "You have to combine the skills of a surgeon, the clear thinking of an engineer and the emotion of a poet" (and I would add, the patience of a fisherman) to do good watercolours. And that description doesn't completely fit the crazy wild artist...

Pig by Carole Carter 2007

But - isn't Groovy the new 'HIP' ?!? Because I dare to argue that WE may just be the new hip!! Think technology, miniaturisation, thinking computers, nano, bio...

Shocking discovery by Chris Beck

Aquarelle watercolours are environmetally friendly, lightweight, refined, ultra detailed, easily miniatured and enlarged, there is fuzzy logic in it and chance - you can do it everywhere and the result is light & poetic, it is difficult to do, interesting and an acquired taste.

It may not be for everybody yet - but I see a very groovy future for our medium!!

The Watercolour Exhibition in Tate III

2011-04-07T00:05:00.001+02:00

As promised for some time now, I was going to write something in reaction to the article of Waldemar Januszczak in the Sunday Times, that criticises the Watercolour exhibition in the The Tate Britain... If you click the scan you can read it for yourself:

THE article... illustration by William Turner

(a watercolour and not a pure aquarelle, look at the yellow...)

The article is a great read and has an introduction that shows Waldemar understands - he sais familiar things!

How about:

"[watercolours are] difficult to display - not only does exposure to sunlight begin to dim watercolours the moment they are out of the box, if you hang a row of them on a wall, they will usually fail to impose themselves on your imagination in a visceral way. There is something timid about he medium. Something sensitive, something inherentely unsuited to the bunga-bungaworld in which we find ourselves..."

and

"...this aspect of watercolour, its facility for miniaturisaton is a feature too..."

Yep, that's us, with the one-hair brush! Much more difficult for the users of the thicker media of course.

and about some 17th century beautifully precise flowers and animal watercolours he goes on:

"Technically, these are scientific illustrations with a scientific purpose in mind. What is being celebrated here is watercolours' excellent portability and descriptive usefulness. Un-technically, some instinctive associaton between watercolour and the yearning for paradise is also being sensed here. Innocence seems te be a watercolour quality too ..."

OK- so we established that he understands the medium- the point of his article is however, that watercolours aren't sexy, or "Groovy" and that the Tate has therefore put up work that can't be called watercolours:

"[the] organisers are so fearful of watercolour being seen as mumsy or old-ashioned they shovel in a host of contemporary practitioners who are undeserving of inclusion"

And that's a subject we'll discuss later, aquarellista Sandra Seymour-Dale is visiting the expo as we speak and we'll wait for her verdict (and I may go to London too, a bit later). The only thing I would like to argue, right now, for the record, is that serious and groovy watercolour artists do exist. They work in a serious and actual, nowadays style, abstract, surrealist, scientific, inspired by street art, etc. etc. They have something to tell and they do that with the poetic, fragile, transparent medium of aquarelle watercolours, in the tradition of Turner and Girtin and Cozens... In the coming time I'll show some watercolours that I think represent the 'groovy' that he refers to...

'Renew' a large size watercolour by Catherine Earle

Vote for my portrait!

2011-03-28T17:52:00.000+02:00

It would be so great if a struggling artist could actually win an artistic year all paid for! Or just a whopping 2500$! That's what you can help me with, by voting for my artwork - every day! If you want to bookmark it, the link is:

http://marinakulik.see.me/aw2011

and you can also click on the image on the left...

Rate my portfolio by clicking a star (the fifth is the highest) and you're done!

THANKS!!

Win or not, my gratefulness to you, my dear voters, will be endless! I have no clue how other contestants do - it is not very 'transparent' - but I needed over 5000 for the Saatchi vote and this is probably in the same line, so, a long road to go... But I keep the faith ha ha...The contest ends April the 15th

Guan Weixing

2011-03-27T15:07:00.004+02:00

I know, I know, I promised to write a reaction on the article by Waldemar Januszczak in the Sunday Times that said that watercolours couldn't be groovy - and I will, but one way or another the words won't come... In the meantime I'd like to introduce this Chinese MASTER aquarellista: Guan Weixing

Guan Weixing

And especially recommend his portraits, because they are so unbelievably, breathtakingly good...

Backlighting - Guan Weixing

He is that good since 1962, so there's definitely consistency there...

Widower - Guan Weixing

Weixing is regarded as one of the most authoritative and influential watercolourists. He has a blog but unfortunately that is in Chinese... I have placed a link to his website (in English) in the Aquarellista blog's link-list and I recommend you to go there -and enjoy big time!!

Expo Aquarellistas in Dutch Consulate in Nice

2011-03-21T00:35:00.003+01:00

From March 1st onwards, until 2012, a couple of aquarelle watercolours created by the Marina Artist Team will be on display in the Dutch Consulate in Nice. The Marina Artist Team are Marina Kulik, Marina Teding-van Berkhout and Cathie van der Stel, three aquarellistas, who work together on commissions for houses, portraits (of people and pets) and wedding bouquets.

The Consulate already owns a portrait in aquarelle of her Majesty Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, made by Marina Kulik.

Shown are a puppy 'Senna' and 'Grapes' by Marina Teding van Berkhout

'Black Beauty' a portrait and 'Poppies' by Cathie van der Stel

'Helena' a portrait of a little girl and 'Cat & Frog' by Marina Kulik.

All aquarelles on display are for sale and the MATeam looks forward to your commissions!

The exhibition is open to everybody visiting the Dutch consulate - which will most probably Dutch people, hence the Dutch translation below...

Vanaf 1 maart jl tot 2012, zijn er zes aquarellen, gemaakt door het Marina Artist Team, te zien in het Nederlands Consulaat te Nice. Het Marina Artist Team bestaat uit Marina Kulik, Marina Teding-van Berkhout en Cathie van der Stel, drie ‘aquarellista’s’, die samenwerken aan opdrachten voor huizen, portretten (van mensen en dieren) en bruidsboeketten.

Het consulaat heeft al een aquarel van Marina Kulik in haar bezit, namelijk het portret van Hare Majesteit Koningin Beatrix.

Er hangen een Berner Senner pup en Druiven van Marina Teding van Berkhout, een portret van een prachtige donkere vrouw en klaprozen van Cathie van der Stel en een portret van een klein meisje en ‘Cat & Frog’ van Marina Kulik. De tentoonstelling is te bezichtigen door iedereen die het consulaat bezoekt. Alle getoonde schilderijen zijn te koop…en het Marina Artist Team is ook zeer geinteresseerd in uw opdrachten!

The Sunday Telegraph Watercolour Competition

2011-03-12T14:41:00.001+01:00

The Sunday Telegraph is launching a watercolour painting competition for enthusiastic amateurs! The closing date is 23 March and everything is explained in the following article (click the link to read)

Bibbi Isaksson

I'm sure this could be very interesting for those amongst you who are not 'professional' artists - which to my opinion has nothing to do with the quality of your work, it just means that it is not how you make your living...

Sandra Seymour-Dale

The contest was inspired by the Watercolour exhibition in the Tate Britain, about which I wrote in the previous post and I owe you one more in the next...

Cathie van der Stel

NB: The illustrations are randomly chosen great watercolours

Tate Britain's Watercolour exhibition I

2011-03-06T22:52:00.004+01:00

Since 16 February and until 21 August, there's an exhibition of watercolours in the Tate Britain in London.

My first reaction was 'yippee!' followed by the decision to work extra hard for a while and save money to go there (and I still plan to do just that). It has loads of Turners and the whole history is shown, including very modern watercolours... Exciting!

Venice by William Turner

My second thought however was "why an exhibition on 'watercolours'???"

I was irritated! Why have an exhibition with a medium, a painting technique as driving force: nobody would organize an exhibition 'Acrylics' or 'Oils'...hgrrmpf... what do you think... might that be because watercolours aren't taken seriously as a stand-alone artform even in the country that has a watercolour tradition... Although it is the oldest existing painting technique! Although nothing is so beautiful, transparent, interesting, spontaneous!

And then I realized that although there will probably never be serious exhibitions on 'Oil painting through the ages' or 'A century of painting in Acrylics' there is a very sympathetic reason for a watercolour-only exhibition: watercolours are a niche, an acquired taste, they are the 'poetry' of painting...

And we, the aquarellistas, the people who have chosen this technique as our raison d'être, as our most important means of expression of our art, we can be proud that we belong... to the poetry niche of all painting!

There is much to write about the subject. In the next post I'll react on an article about this Tate Watercolour expo in the Sunday Times. The article has got a lot of things right, but there's one header we can't let pass: "...don't ask [watercolours] to be groovy" - mmmm - watch this space!

Watercolours can't be groovy?? Here's one - by Sandra Seymour Dale

Painting a house from a very bad picture

2011-02-11T21:15:00.001+01:00

Because 'voting for Marina's portrait' is over (thank you for voting! Four votes short of the finale!! I'll definitely try again soon) anyway, I need a new post and have no time, so I'll bore you once more with another chapter on 'how to paint a house'.

I got a commission from a realtor, to paint a house in Antibes as present for his client. The only picture he had available was less than 10cm long and looked like this:

But - I was allowed artistic freedom, and that made it a very good commission! I took my favourite flowers, Irises, and painted them in the foreground:

The grass was straightforward, the front of the house hard to see but the trick of dark half shadows gave it a very sunny outlook! I skipped the closed parasol or other dark high thin thing and made up a palmtree. And of course a bright blue sky...

The yellow border by the way is masking fluid, which helps me keep inside the lines - for a neat effect.

And the finished product - lots of contrast, a tree, some extra flowers and a bit of reflection in the pool.

I was happy painting it and I'm happy with the result!

Marina Kulik in the Saatchi Showdown

2011-01-31T21:41:00.001+01:00

Here's a request for all of you aquarelle-artlovers out there: could you help me by voting on the self portrait in aquarelle (on handmade paper) that I put up in the “Showdown” on the great “Saatchi” website?

(interesting for all artists! Join it and use it for your art too!)

To be able to vote you go to http://www.saatchionline.com/marinakulik

Underneath the photo (of yours truly, holding a glass of champagne) there's a link "vote here"
Click it
Saatchi now wants you to become a member: I can recommend that, they don't bother you and they do organize a lot of interesting things for artists.
So, fill out the blanks in “Join us it’s free” in the right upper corner of the webpage.
(Remember your password!)
Saatchi will then send you a confirmation email.
Click the link they give you…and VOTE....

It is a fun experiment and I am in the top 10% right now and it would be such fun to get to the finals!
If I succeed I'll let you know: even more voting necessary!
Thank you very much in advance...and I'd do the same for you of course!

Marina Kulik

More about the Aquarelle Grand Prix

2011-01-16T23:16:00.001+01:00

"Roses without thorns" is the theme of this Grand Prix, organized by Belgian Aquarellista Piet van Aken.

It is an international contest, you are allowed to participate with at most three aquarelles, one of those must have the theme, the other two are free.

The submitted work needs to be authentic and original and must not, in any way refer to work of other artists

Only pure aquarelle, painted on paper will be taken into account.

The work must be painted in 2011 and not exhibited before. (This means that the Hangar-aquarellistas can do a lot on our Tuesday-sessions...) Let's go for it!!

This one is not suitable for instance: made in 2008 and already exhibited...

The deadline for submission of registration forms August 31st 2011, so there's plenty of time still - but it would be good to start thinking about what you would like to do.

Judging and selection will take place on Saturday 17 September, and max 100 artworks will be selected

Exhibition is from 5 - 26 November in in the exhibition space of the NV Lucas Creativ, Kroonstraat 182, 3020 Veltem-Beisem in Belgium

The vernissage and announcement of winners will be on 5 November

There is an extensive downloadable "rules and regulations" form and a registration form -in Dutch and French- on http://www.pietvanaken.be/ . If you want one in English, contact me, I have a preliminary version. Note that the rules for contestants from abroad are slightly less strict. Don't hesitate to contact me - or Piet van Aken for extra info...

More later!!

Another no-go (from 2003)

Pre-announcement Belgian "Piet van Aken Prize" Aquarelle contest

2011-01-10T17:32:00.000+01:00

All Aquarellistas are invited (via a letter to our webmaster) to participate in a Belgian Aquarelle Contest!

I have the rules in my posession but they are in Dutch, I'll translate and post them integrally as soon as I have time.

Here's the gist:
Work has to be authentic and original and only PURE aquarelle on paper will be fit for selection
Work must be created in 2011 and not shown in another exhibition
Max 100 "winning" aquarelles selected for big expo in Belgium
They are considered for:
The Public's Prize
First Prize 1000€
Second and Third Prize 500€ each
Several other prizes and recommendations (of the Flemish Community, Schmincke, Winsor&Newton,Arte etc)

Subscription costs 20€ (to cover costs of the organization)
Organizer Piet van Aken is an interesting aquarellista himself, for his work see the illustrations of this post and his website http://www.pietvanaken.be/

Mariette du Maine

2011-01-06T13:55:00.000+01:00

Mariette is an old Dutch friend, and an excellent artist and aquarellista! At the moment she is working on an illustrated book comparing and relating the Provence and 'het Gooi' (an especially beautiful area in Holland). The drawings are based on her 'carnets de voyage' which she makes while traveling in her favourite area, the Provence...

Here's our scoop - a sneak preview of three illustrations for the book (click to enlarge):

"Town hall squares" - and fountains (in Aix en Provence)

"Sheep" - Transhumance (in Guillaume)

Potimarron - a happy word on this grey Friday (in Apt)

To see more work of Mariette du Maine go to her website www.everyoneweb.com/mariettedumaine (also in our link-list) and I'll keep you posted on the availability of the book...

A CREATIVE AND INSPIRED 2011 TO ALL OF YOU!

2011-01-04T00:12:00.001+01:00

In both of these aquarelles (the planet on handmade, very rough paper and the abstract below, on smooth satin paper) I used salt. Salt gives a wonderful effect, in the same line as the aquarelle paint itself: you can never exactly know what the effect will be, but if you don't try to control it, it will not disappoint or frustrate you, but provide exciting results.

Other 'salty' aquarelles:

Christmas card by Marina Teding van Berkhout

'Nebula' by Bibbi Isaksson

'See through' by Birgitta Engvall

'Chateauneuf' by Anna-Karin Fast

Wiliam Turner II

2010-12-14T11:24:00.006+01:00

Turner is known as "the painter of the light" which I think is a very well-deserved title. To me his work was a true inspiration, I remember going to an exhibition of his watercolours in London when I was still in art school. I realized what is possible with aquarelle and it actually made me decide to concentrate more on that medium.

sketch Turner made of the cathedral in Rouen - look at the combination of ink and watercolours

His work is impressionist (although in his time that didn't exist!). In oil as well as watercolours Turner was the first who didn't try to achieve complete realism, but gave that away for atmosphere and emotion.

I read somewhere on the internet that Constable once said about his work "he seems to paint with tinted steam, so evanescent and airy"... In this day and age we would consider that a compliment! But it was meant as a sneer (compare "Fauvism", now a much loved painting style- but the terminology was first used to degrade the painters as wild animals...) England (the world) wasn't ready for full-blown aquarelle and impressionism yet!

In this aquarelle (Ewenny Priory, in the National Museum of Wales in Cardiff) Turner used perspective and light to achieve a sense of vast space

Sunrise, 1845 - Made during the Industrial Revolution: it has been suggested that the pollution might be reflected in Turner's paintings

Turner died 76 years old (a respectable age in those days). From what I found about him he was slightly crazy, but a good person, and we should be thankful that he left us so much fantastic and inspiring work! Like all great modern artists he researched, in his case for possibilities to express atmosphere, emotion, scale, vastness in a painting. He didn't just use watercolours, his oils are also very very impressive, but hey, we're aquarellistas! Below two more extremely beautiful - and clever - watercolours...

William Turner I

2010-12-02T22:52:00.001+01:00

William Turner (Joseph Mallord William Turner, 1775 - 1851) was an English watercolourist, a predecessor Aquarellista! In the next post I'll write a bit about his style, in this one more about his life.

Turner was born into a middle-class family in London. His father was a wig-maker and barber. His mother died while he was quite young. William Turner was sent to live in the countryside with relatives who soon discovered that he was very talented: he painted this castle when he was 10 years old:

Unbelievable... he could definitely observe...

He joined the Royal Academy of Art at the age of 14 - and, surprise surprise, he excelled. He left London in 1798 "with little more than a borrowed pony and pencils" and started painting a series of landscapes around Wales...

This work he made as a 23-year-old in his Hereford Court sketchbook. It fetched up £500,000 at a Christie’s auction...

Turner had success and made a fortune when he was quite young. That gave himl the opportunity to innovate freely.

Young William Turner - selfportrait as a bit of a dandy

Turner travelled widely in Europe, starting with France and Switzerland in 1802 and studying in the Louvre in Paris in the same year.

He also made many visits to Venice

As he grew older, Turner became more eccentric. His paintings changed in style and his audience struggled to understand his vision. He had few close friends except for his father, who lived with him for thirty years, eventually working as his studio assistant.

Old William Turner - in his atelier

And the atelier once more - look again - and you'll see how impressive it is... especially if you realize that this was painted in the 19th century!

William Turner died on 19 December 1851 and lies buried in St Paul's Cathedral. He left his money to support what he called "decayed artists". He designed an almshouse for them at Twickenham, with a gallery for some of his works. But some relatives contested the will and part of his fortune was awarded to the family. The rest went to the Royal Academy of Arts who still from time to time award students the Turner Medal...

NB: I have used pictures from the Turner special in the Figaro - to have a look inside, borrow it from me or order via http://www.lefigaro.fr/

On Contrast

2010-11-22T17:10:00.001+01:00

I am not sure what's behind it, experience or style or just getting older, but lately I came to realise that to me the standard improvement of an aquarelle (and, by the way, of a painting in general) always lies in the "contrast" - and mainly the contrast between light and dark. In other words, to improve - make the shadow darker. If you add a good one, your painting becomes more sunny, more interesting... It often works even better if you overdo it a bit... Of the portrait above I don't have the "before" picture, but you see what I mean - the shadows are very strong and as far as I remember I painted them much heavier than they were.

It works on almost everything:

An example of a house that looked very bland - until I added contrast practically on everything...

And one I recently finished - making the shadow slightly darker gives the whole image a sunnier look...

Yet sometimes things just don't end up as you would expect... This is an Xmas ball by Cathie van der Stel that she declared in the category "tear up and throw away". I didn't agree and claimed to be able to make it interesting with a bit of contrast... but it just got darker... o well, it was good fun to do it and you can't have it all!

Starting next week I'll introduce one of our aquarellistas and their work to you each week - it is amazing that a group which works so peaceful together, has members whose work is so completely different. But they're all great! The reports on what we have actually achieved on the Tuesday will stay too, but they'll move to another blog, as a matter of fact, the blogspot of the atelier where we get together, the Hangar...

It's just been set up, no information on it yet, but if you are interested anyway - this is the link:

http://hangarart.blogspot.com/

A 60's portrait

2010-11-15T17:14:00.000+01:00

In the beginning of 2010, aquarellista and gifted artist Bibbi Isaksson joined in on a project that we started, with the intention to make a personal impression in aquarelle, inspired on a photo of a loved one...

Bibbi chose this photo

The first stage

Somehow she wasn't happy with it (although we all liked it a lot) and I guess all of you recognise this. A good thing to do if you aren't pleased with your unfinished aquarelle, or not sure where to go next, is to take scraps of aquarelle paper and paint on them what you think might be a good next step and put that on top of your painting. That's what Bibbi did - and she also happens to understand Photoshop and tried some things out with that:

Sunglasses added on the girl - and decision that that is not the solution...

That's so good about testing a next step this way. Same goes for backgrounds and bright colours and other 'risky' changes:if you put them on for real you can't get rid of them in our transparent medium aquarelle...

The next step - the couple gets more shape and colour and they are in love a bit more

But Bibbi was not satisfied with the way this was going and did the other thing that we can recommend: put your painting away and don't look at it for some time! Sometimes paintings grow beautiful in a couple of weeks or months without you doing anything to them, apart from not-looking. And sometimes after some time you just know what should be done...

So in April, Bibbi picked it up again and decided to add a more sixties athmosphere

And last month she finished this aquarelle! It has taken half a year and it has truly grown - into a very rich picture, full of memories, layers, songs and symbols.

Added to that - it has the outlook of a beautiful poster, with colours deep and strong.

The bottomline: if your aquarelle is "ok", but you are not happy, don't give up! Put it away, discuss it with friends, use scraps of paper to see what certain colours would look like, use photoshop (if you can) to check creative next steps and often you will get to something you are indeed happy with...

Or at least you will have learned! And if it ends up being ruined for sure, don't worry be happy! Use it to light the fire, or tear it up and keep the nice parts for a next venture!

Thoughts on "Being an artist"

2010-11-08T21:35:00.000+01:00

Being an artist - or what makes you an artist - that's something I have been thinking about for a long time... in fact, since I finished art school (a long time ago). And although I had diplomas in painting, graphics and monumental design - and made (a bit of) money as a portrait painter - I didn't call myself an artist. In retrospect I wonder why, because I answered my (current) requirements - but at that time I thought, I am so young, I need so much more experience, there are so many other artists who know more than me... what if they criticize me, what if they think I'm crap and make fun of me...

Funny because nobody hesitates to call themself an architect or a teacher or a chef... or do they?

Well - ok, it took some time but right now I'm over myself and don't have the problem anymore and I happily call myself an artist and painter and aquarellista! I have come up with a couple of thoughts on the subject, that you can have a look at for yourself. I know a lot of you out there don't dare to call yourselves artists - because of modesty and nagging doubts and insecurities - although I think you might just be one.

Note that these are my personal criteria - I am 100% open to input and corrections and discussion about them.

1. My occupation is artist, I call myself an artist, write it on official forms etc
2. I take responsibility for my work
3. I have something to say that I want the world to hear and I show it through my work
4. My work is constantly developing and there's thought behind it
5. There is nothing I 'd rather do and I feel my work is somehow important
6. I am good in -and proud of- what I do (craftsmanship)
7. I am original (or aim to be)
8. I want to make a living out of my art
9. I would love to show my work to as broad an audience as possible
10. I see my work as public domain (like a book or a play or a piece of music).

All of the above sounds quite confident and I am - in a way. Yet at the same time I'm ever doubtful and wandering and wondering and struggling (like an artist should! )

Painting houses - some pointers

2010-11-01T15:08:00.000+01:00

Last time we were only a small group and we had fun, working hard and smart at the same time. We didn't finish our projects though and decided to keep the pictures for a later post.

Which means that this week I'll use this space - to give a couple of pointers for painting houses (I just finished a commission for one)...

1: If you have to paint a fence or a railing that is in front of something else, it works really well to leave the railing white and start with the background - paint it around the railing. Draw the lines with pencil and rub them out when the background is done & dry (you can also use masking fluid but it is lots of work and often a bit messy for straight lines).

Ok, so you have the white railing like the picture above, now decide the direction the light comes from in your picture, and leave a tiny line white where the light would fall on the rail, even if you don't really see that.

2: Below two balcony's done in this way... What you also see there is THE trick to make a window look sunny: just make the top parts of the doorposts dark - and there it is. Works like a dream! Try it!

Note that shadows are much darker (at least 40%) than the sunny parts - and it is not bad to overdo it a bit in your painting...

3. And here's another important one for if you want to paint a realistic-looking lawn in front of a darker background: start with the grass and paint the background around it - or leave the pointy grass shapes out when you paint the background.

If you don't do it like that, since aquarelle paint is transparent, the darker background will shine through - like on the left:

That's it for now... o, don't get me started, there 's so much more where that came from... but I'll keep it for other posts. If you are interested, below a small "making of" movie of the housepainting-commission I just finished, and that I used for the examples above...

Portraits in aquarelle I

2010-10-25T22:26:00.004+02:00

As you may remember we have been working in a kind of collage style the past two weeks - we stuck a scrap of magazine on a piece of watercolour paper and finished it - with a great effect. Turns out that everybody one way or another wanted to do portraits - and that's what we basically painted last week - and it will stay our subject for the coming time...

Last week the aquarellista's finished some impressive work!

Sandra Seymour-Dale wasn't there the past couple of weeks and to make up for that she created a portrait collage for starters! In typical Sandra-style it looks in a critical way at cosmetic surgery

Sandra Seymour-Dale's next painting - to be finished but looking very interesting already!

A wonderfully quiet girl -by Cathie van der Stel (aren't they lovely when they sleep!)

Ann Edwards picked "hair" as a project - and painted a face to go with that! She is going to concentrate on children's portraits the coming time

You wouldn't think so at first sight - but this is going to be a portrait too! Probably. And maybe not, maybe it is going to be a collage, but whatever it is going to be - the first part looks great! As you will probably have recognised, it is Bibbi Isaksson's work...

Hélène van der Kroft has been working really hard on painting "hands and feet". After that she needed something else and let herself go in this brilliant flowery composition

And last but not least - this fan-tas-tic snowscape, by Marianne van Wijngaarden.

By the way, she is contemplating a misty meadow with cows to replace the snow - I'll keep you posted on the developments!

Collage & Aquarelle II

2010-10-18T22:10:00.000+02:00

First of all, I must excuse my pictures, I'm not sure if it is the camera or me, but anyway, they all came out blurry... The quality of the underlying paintings is very good I assure you!

We continued our experiment with the pieces of newspaper, all in our own way: below you'll see 4 completely different points of view!

Bibbi Isaksson finished one - it started out as a very innocent picnic-picture and has turned into a VERY interesting magic realistic symbolic funny sad narrative! There are so many things happening in this picture... amazing! Click picture to enlarge. Note that Bibbi used every line, every dot, every colour in the torn picture to express her imagination...

Cathie van der Stel tore the torn picture in two and used the colours and the texture for a fantasy still life - with a strange transparency and a hidden cat!

Horst Timmermans used a picture of Cinqueterre in an original idea, that needs to be worked out still - it is a view from a window in the train - we see it in passing...

And Lies Timmermans finished a collage picture in a logical way - there's a nice picnic going on there, the painting & photo seem to comunicate...

There was also a sub-project going on - with light/dark/contrast as its most important feature:

Woman with a hat - in the sun.

By Ann Edwards

Village in the sun

By Horst Timmermans

Redhead in the sun

By Hélène van der Kroft

Collage & Aquarelle

2010-10-11T18:53:00.001+02:00

Anna-Karin Fast was our transparency-hero last week... all the aquarellista's jumped on the new collage idea, yet Anna-Karin worked and finished this double transparent glass jar within a vase... A beautiful composition - and very transparent. I admire her stamina! And tomorrow she's most probably joining the rest of us in phase two of the "collage" project...

Ann Edwards working on her collage picture - outside in the sun

Almost finished... sorry for the crappy pic! magazine clipings don't go so well with flashlights...

I brought lots of torn strips of pictures out of magazines, to be finished in aquarelle, with fantasy - but in the colours as close as possible to the original...it turned out to be an interesting as well as inspiring exercise! Of course there were only parts of the pictures and to finish them, everybody had to imagine the rest of the picture. It worked for everyone - as you can see below (and above)

Creation number 1 by Bibbi Isaksson - despite the use of a printed picture in the middle it is 100% Bibbi-style!

Creation number 2 by Bibbi Isaksson - not finished but already intriguing!

Brenda Moorehouse's picture, she used her imagination (see open door)

Cathie van der Stel in a very pretty and promising composition, unfinished, I look forward to seeing where it is going!

Fantasy bicycle by Marina Kulik - to be structurally changed - and then finished

VERY happy picture by Marina Teding van Berkhout - to be finished, we wonder if she's going to work with all these little squares!!

Picture: Marina working on the happy girl with balloons, Cathie in the background holding her work upside down so the wet aquarelle paint can drip in the right direction... Next time we are moving on with the collage idea, we have discussed it and will try for portraits, based on pictures of familymembers & friends. And we may also experiment with black and white...

Transparency continued

2010-10-04T17:03:00.001+02:00

Because it is such an incredibly inspiring subject, we continued our developments on the theme "transparency"... Not all the work is finished and I am sure that I'll have more pictures for you next week - but here are some impressions. And as you can see every artist has their own interpretation...

Cathie van der Stel working with a sable brush from Da Vinci on an abstract

Cathie van der Stel's finished "glass bottles" - we all agreed that this is a GREAT aquarelle, of calm, poetic beauty

Beverly Ellsley finished last week's project by making the transparency clearer and tying up some loose ends! We like the contrast of glass versus tablecloth and do you notice the dish is actually floating! This aquarelle would make great illustration of a childrens' book - or may inspire a writer...

Helene van der Kroft's glass bottles - a playful composition!

Helene is a very fast painter, she makes at least 4 aquarelles per session - last week she did a great one of a couple of birds, a bit out-of subject but I'll surely keep it for another post.

Horst Timmermans' glasses

Horst worked them out in a very straight-forward, simple way, by painting all different colours separately and as you can see that works really well!

A different approach, with an uncomplicated composition by Marianne van Wijngaarden

These bottles truly are Very Transparent, well done!

And we have a winner in Lies Timmermans... this is a folded organza scarf (but you recognized that I'm sure).

I am very enthousiastic about it, it looks SO real! Lies is going to work a bit more on it tomorrow, but as far as I am concerned - not too much!

What we use for all of the above, is stretched "grain torchon" paper, of the brand Arche, paints of Winsor&Newton and a variety of brushes, sable for the precise work (they hold lots of watery paint, are resilient and keep their points), petit gris (I suspect that translates into "squirrel") for the wet in wet work and a lot of other brushes - from ponyhair to synthetic.

Transparency

2010-09-26T23:32:00.002+02:00

The palette of Anna-Karin Fast, working on her still life

We started our transparency project last week - the weather was great, sunny, not too hot and although none of us had done much painting during the summer months, it went great for everybody! I am proud of the results, they vary from very simple to complex. As you can see, most of us took 'glass' in one form or another as a means to express transparency in an aquarelle, but there were also some experiments with fabric...

Stones in a glass bowl - Anna Karin Fast

Three bottles by Bibbi Isaksson

'One bottle' by Marianne van Wijngaarden

Bottle and glass by Horst Timmermans

Bird behind curtain by Gisela Dijksterhuis

Ann Edwards painted this simple glass vase with flowers, based on an existing painting of Ronald Jesty "Sweet peas in a tumbler" and she added the "curtain" (using slightly lighter and bluer colours to suggest that) which makes the picture even more interesting!

There is more where this came from - I owe you the aquarelle of Cathie who is working on an excellent still life with coloured bottles and Sandra's very very expressive portrait of a lady, with transparency used in a symbolic way. We'll definitely go on with the research coming session... so watch this space for more!

Provence in Aquarelle III

2010-09-19T22:58:00.001+02:00

The exhibition in Casablù is over- and we can look back on a success - for our favourite technique, for the aquarellistas and for our wallets too, as we sold lots! I took some pictures with my phone of what it looked like inside, for those of you who missed the show!

Coming Tuesday we'll resume our regular Aquarellista sessions - and we'll start with research into "transparency"... I'm sure the results will be worthwhile, and I'll show them -as always- in my next post!

Provence in Aquarelle II

2010-09-13T22:32:00.003+02:00

As mentioned in the previous post - since last Saturday the Aquarellistas are showing their impressions of the Provence in gallery Casablù in Valbonne... It is a fantastic experience, we have a lot of people visiting, they love it, appreciate what we are doing and we get a chance to tell them about the great qualities of aquarelle...

Yesterday, Sunday, we had our official opening, with champagne and fabulous nibbles by aquarellista/chef Helen Bate. I'm not quite sure how many people showed up, but it felt like there were at least hundred art-lovers!!

And what's more - we are selling! These aquarelles have found new happy homes (and more to follow I bet!!)

"Leaving Home" by Cathie van der Stel

"Old man" by Marina Teding van Berkhout

"Olives" by Helen Bate

"Olives" by Sandra Seymour-Dale

"St Paul" by Cathie van der Stel

Come and visit us and check out our aquarelles until Friday 18 September 2PM!

The address: Casablù in the Rue Eugene Giraud in the old centre of Valbonne.

One or two of us are always there - although we may close at lunchtime to grab a sandwich. We look forward to seeing you...

Exhibition: Provence in Aquarelle

2010-09-08T22:44:00.003+02:00

From Saturday 11 to Friday 18 September, six aquarellista's show their impressions of beautiful Provence in Gallery Casablù in Valbonne. You are most welcome to visit us and have a look, we're open every day from 10 - 12 and from 14 - 17hrs and one or two of us are always there!

Casablù is in the old village of Valbonne, near the Place des Arcades and the famous toyshop in la Rue Eugène Giraud.

Exhibiting are Cathie van der Stel, Helen Bate, Marina Teding van Berkhout, Sandra Seymour-Dale and yours truly, Marina Kulik.

We're going to put up our work coming Friday and I'll be back to you with pictures of what it all looks like, so watch this space!!

Femmes du Monde

2010-09-05T00:27:00.001+02:00

It's showtime!! Right now I'm in the Salon d'art contemporain in Valbonne, a big contemporary Art Fair, see also http://www.marinakulik.com/news/; Sunday that will be finished.

Next 6 aquarellista's will show their impressions of "Provence" in Gallery Casablù: count on some posts about that. And I have 6 paintings in Rumania - but I promised you some information about the group exhibition in Nice airport: "Women of the World".

It's on since 30 August, showing all kinds of paintings and sculptures of women from all over the world. I am showing the three portraits I painted for Pink Ribbon, as well as four other women's portraits, all in transparent aquarelle.

The vernissage will be on Friday 1 October and if you have a chance to go, don't hesitate - the drinks and nibbles are great, and so is the artwork!

Contemporary Art in Valbonne

2010-08-29T23:46:00.002+02:00

From 2 to 5 September the annual "Salon d'Art Contemporain" takes place in one of the most lovely villages of the Côte d'Azur - Valbonne. At least one Aquarellista will participate: yours truly, Marina Kulik.

Maybe there are other aquarelle artists - I will definitely let you know.

I plan to show my DNA ribbons, combined with the multicolour roses, of which I finished another one today.

"Multicolour Rose 10" Aquarelle on handmade paper

Tomorrow I'm putting up work in the Airport for the "Femmes du Monde" (Women of the world) exhibition and I'll take some pictures to keep you up to date. That show will run until November, with a vernissage in October, so plenty of time still... but one thing for sure: the holidays are over!

Provence Part IV

2010-08-23T23:47:00.001+02:00

Shoes on the sand - work in progress by Sandra Seymour-Dale

The aquarellistas had one more session before their well-deserved summerbreak... We got together on 27 July - and I didn't write an update: I've been without internet for a long time, it was repaired today!!

But pictures are patient, and the results were that good that a month later I still like too present them. In preparation of our Aquarellista's in Provence-exhibition in September, the theme was "Provence" once more:

Hanneke Kulik visited the atelier, worked with us and showed that she is a true aquarellista, with this branch of a fig tree

Three towers by Ann Edwards

Number Five, Six and Seven in the serie "Doors" by Horst Timmermans

Farm in the Provence by Lies Timmermans

Provence Village by Sandra Seymour-Dale

Special guests!

2010-08-01T16:59:00.002+02:00

Happy Cat by Zamira Timmermans

We had a splendid last-session-before-the-holidays, with a couple of visitors...

Seeing the picture above you may think that they were part of a Cobra group of aquarellista's - but actually they were Lies and Horsts' grandchildren Maurice and Zamira - and they are both talented as well as full of ideas and enthusiasm!

Star Wars Trilogy by Maurice Timmermans

Above a picture of part of the group in our normal environment (isn't it fantastic!).

Check out where Maurice got the inspiration from for his other painting...(click on the photo to enlarge it)

Chair balanced on one leg by Maurice Timmermans

Red Castle by Zamira Timmermans

And here you see the artists at work... The grown-ups have been working as well, I'll post about that later in August! Become a follower if you'd like to get a message when there is a fresh aquarellista post!

Aquarelle - Fun ideas & inspiration

2010-07-25T15:19:00.001+02:00

Fantasy portrait by Renée Richters

You may have noticed that there was no post last week: I was traveling to and from Holland, and didn't have time - but the aquarellista's came together as usual and had a wonderful day in the shadow of the trees around our atelier "the Hangar"... And they did a lot of interesting work there, some of which might inspire you!!

First of all Cathie came up with the idea to put bubblewrap on wet paint, let it dry and then take it off. A very interesting effect, below 3 very different results!

Abstract by guest-from-New Zealand, Jill. She used bubblewrap as well as masking fluid, for an interesting deep-sea effect

Abstract by Cathie van der Stel, again with interesting effects because of the bubblewrap but with a different approach

Provence Grapes - by Marina Teding van Berkhout - inspired by the bubblewrap effect!

In that same theme but without the bubblewrap: Figs by Ann Edwards

Bouquet of Anemones by Helene van der Kroft in her typical, lighthearted style

Truci house by Jill

Provence village - work (very promising!) in progress by Sandra Seymour-Dale

Coming Tuesday we'll have a last, very relaxed session, with many guests and then we're offline for a month! I'll try to update you now and then - but not as regular as you are used to! If you want to make sure you don't miss a post - become a "follower"

Provence - Part III

2010-07-12T22:55:00.003+02:00

The aquarellista group is working seriously on the "Provence" theme for our exhibition in September, and the results are getting better all the time! Here's some of the work we produced last week in the gorgeous Provence sun - with lots more to come and to be finished!!

Sandra Seymour-Dale's Provence window - sunny and hot!

Cathie van der Stel's Farm in Lavender field

Carol, aquarellista from Devon and frend of Ann Edwards, visited last year May and returned this July to create a fabulous village view!

We actually had another visitor, from Australia, Cathie's dad George. He started with a couple of drawings in pastel, then switched to watercolours and turned out to be a worthy member of the aquarellista group! He liked the material a lot and promised to develop further back home.

He made one landscape that was subtle and simple - and when we did the roundup some of us found that it looked better upside down... You decide...

Visitor George's 2 versions of the same landscape...

George creating his aquarelle

Excellent old Provence door by Horst Timmermans

Olive-fantasy II by Helen Bate

and the intriguing "Jardinier in the mist" by Marina Teding van Berkhout

We'll have another session tomorrow, where some interesting work will be finished - you can look forward to that in the coming weeks!

Art Supermarket in Valbonne

2010-07-07T00:14:00.002+02:00

Super Marché de l’Art

July is the month of the street theatre festival in Valbonne, and within that, the artothèque organises a "Super Marché de l’Art" - an Art Supermarket, from 9 to 11 July.

This supermarket is an exhibition combined with the possibility to buy original artworks (paintings, sculptures and objects), built up like a traditional supermarket: The visitors can shop and fill their baskets with original artwork - or just admire! Creativity and humor will surprise the public, there will be stands where the artists are demonstrating - and you may be invited to join in. There is a very special wine stand, a fish "rayon" and much more...

One of the 15 artists who present their work is Aquarellista Marina Kulik. She will present her Multicolour Roses, and the necklaces, bracelets and earrings she designed for Dutch jewelry brand "MERRL" within that same theme.

The Supermarché de l'art takes place from 9 - 11 July

Pré des Arts – parking de la Vignasse

06560 Valbonne village

More information:

Artothèque l’Art Tisse 14

Rue de la Fontaine

06560 Valbonne Village

Tél. : 04 93 42 04 56

art-tisse@wanadoo.fr

http://www.art-tisse.com/

Provence continued

2010-07-05T22:18:00.001+02:00

You may remember that a part of our aquarellista team is going to have an exhibition in Valbonne in September, and that we have decided to let ourselves be inspired by "Provence". A broad subject! But close to us... Last week we did a couple of versions of "olives". It's fun to see the different styles!

Cathie van der Stel's olives - with a lavender bush

Sandra Seymour-Dale's airy version

a classic olive version by Marina Kulik

an olive inspired artistic impression by Helen Bate

In the coming weeks we will develop and work out all kinds of other Provence inspired aquarelles: with landscapes, poppies, villages and more... Preparations already started!

Poppy by Sandra Seymour-Dale

Landscape by Horst Timmermans - painted around his real subject: the sky...

Provence cloud, also by Horst Timmermans (well done!)

and to top it all off Horst painted a quick Provence onion

and last but not least Provence Irises by Lies Timmermans! note the background - just cerulean in a couple of washes - it works!

Abstract Aquarelles

2010-06-28T21:51:00.000+02:00

"Just for the colours" by starter Gisela Dijksterhuis

The aquarellista group is working on a Provence project (see post below) yet there is plenty of room and time for some abstract experiment !

Cathie van der Stel is definitely on to something spectacular with her new "line" of abstracts!

a work in progress, also by Cathie van der Stel! She has not looked at it for a week and will finish it tomorrow

Fabulous and funny abstract - by Helen Bate. You can look at it for hours and still discover new things. The bright white spots are actually silver (real leaf silver), so much better looking in real life, but they didn't photograph well... you'll have your chance to see them in our September expo...

Please scroll to see the Provence-Post

Aquarellista's go Provence

2010-06-28T21:35:00.001+02:00

Entrance to Mas in Grasse, Beverly Ellsley

The past week as well as the coming month, our work will be dedicated to the Provence. Because it is a source of inspiration, with so many different possibilities, from landscapes, to villages, to flowers, to abstracts based on colours or shapes! And also because six aquarellista's will have an exhibition in Valbonne in September, showing... their view on the Provence!

Here are a couple of impressions:

Parents of the groom by Brenda Moorhouse

Provence lansdscape by Horst Timmermans

We're slowing working towards "getting the hang of it" ... so watch this space!

"Artour" in Villeneuve Loubet

2010-06-20T21:21:00.000+02:00

Saturday 19 June yours truly participated in an exhibition meant for business people of "our" Silicon Valley, Sophia Antipolis - the high-tech area of the Côte d'Azur. This one-day activity was organized by my agents from Ambre international and held in the Citadel of Villeneuve Loubet, the property of Marquis De Panisse.

The location was stunning! It is built in the 12th century and completely renovated in 1900. It is all perfect and inspiring and these pictures do not do the place justice... It is actually quite a romantic place! And not open for visitors... it was quite an opportunity for artists and invitees alike.

From the remparts there is a 360° view on the sea, the villages, Nice and the mountains.

And around the citadelle is a very well-kept forest that has all kinds of interesting medicinal and rare plants.

We had put up our artwork (paintings and sculptures) outside in the courtyard, the sun was shining and we were giving demonstrations and telling the interested visitors about our work...

And then it started to rain!

I was lucky to have brought lots of plastic, I could cover my precious aquarelles and lend some to my neighbour Michel who makes Japanese-style ink drawings - on paper...

An hour latere the sun came back and stayed for the day. I thought my work looked good in the evening sun with the shadows of the palmtrees!

New Website for Marina Kulik

2010-06-13T21:35:00.001+02:00

Just wanted to let you know that I have a new website, that has more functionality and looks better and more modern than the one I used to have... Take a look and let me know what you think, comments are very welcome...
http://www.marinakulik.com/ (click to check it out!)

And scroll down for the regular post!

Swapping!

2010-06-13T21:19:00.000+02:00

Cathie van der Stel is developing and experimenting with a whole new style... Looking great if you ask me!

Sandra Seymour-Dale was on a roll today

Have I ever posted about one of our favourite subjects in the atelier in Chateauneuf? We call it "swapping" and for one reason or another it is best enjoyed in the summer, when we are outside...yes, I have posted about that: last year, same time... If you want to read about it and see last years' results...:

Click here for the first swapping post

Click here for the second swapping post

a closer look on Sandra's explosive abstract

It is a very simple principle, and really suitable for aquarellista's because they are (have to be) less afraid of failure and less control-freak about their own work:

Create a background and then give your work to somebody else ("swap")! That way you are very free while creating your background, you can experiment and use colours and shapes you wouldn't normally (keep thinking, "who cares it is for somebody else..." it's good for you) and on the recieving end you get shapes and colours that will inspire you to show that you're up to it!

Cathie van der Stel: sheep inside

Anyway - last week we created the backgrounds, with lots of water, laughter, teasing and of course creativity and inspiration - some came out really gorgeous! Coming Tuesday we are going to paint the foregrounds...

Mireille Bonnaud: houses outside

Next to the swapping project we worked on the Inside/Outside theme, and we discussed the September-aquarellista-exhibition. In short, a busy -and fruitful- day! I keep the swapping pictures for next week (when they are hopefully finished), used as illustrations in this post are some of the results of last week...

Roses (one dry, one fresh) by Sandra-Seymour-Dale

dewdrops exercise by Helen Bate Well done! They're rolling from the paper!

Marina Teding van Berkhout's "old ladies on the market"

"Outside" in Chateauneuf

2010-06-07T21:55:00.001+02:00

This is what an aquarellista-afternoon looks like! The lush green is real - so are the girls and their aquarelles... We are still working on our theme "inside-outside" and everybody is having their own interpretation, very interesting! Most of the work is not finished yet, but I thought, I'd give you a sneak preview of the work in progress...

On the outside - Ann Edwards' version, with mysterious windows looking in ...

Brenda Moorehouse was just sketching a bit to get the inspiration going - and look at this, it's just a study but I like it a lot! She started, roughly, with the colours and added the dark lines later. It works!

Beverly Ellsey started this great 'look inside', what's the finished result going to be - a warm, South French evening atmosphere maybe?

And a completely different and clever interpretation by Marianne van Wijngaarden in which she shows inside and outside by means of these tulips...

Brilliant work - but bad bad photo's

2010-05-31T21:34:00.003+02:00

This is the FANTASTIC aquarelle of Mireille Bonnaud! Leaves, in a whirling wind. I'll take a better picture of this one and post it again next week!

The aquarellista group has been working hard and motivated on a couple of things. The starters did VERY GOOD on their next project, "spheres", the others worked on flowers and began experimenting with our theme: "inside/outside"...

But silly me, I pressed some button on my camera and the pictures turned out so small that you can hardly see what's on them!! Luckily most of the work wasn't finished, soI'll get another chance tomorrow!

I will show you the minuscule piccies though, for a preview....

Experiment with spheres by Helen Bate

Butterfly with volume by Mia Schraa

Iris by Brenda Moorehouse (look at that background!!)

Tulips by Sandra Seymour-Dale

She did lots more by the way, on her dried roses series - but you'll have to wait for that until next week, just like Cathie's, Marina's and Ann's work on the inside/outside theme...

Atelier Libre

2010-05-23T23:25:00.002+02:00

Last week a couple of Aquarellista's met up in the Hangar to have a gorgeous lunch (I'm told), do a bit of work, finish projects and have a good time in the sun, with a nice cup of tea....

Of the starters only Helen Bate was present, she created several aquarelles, experimenting with the great aquarelle medium, here is one of them, a wet in wet landscape:

She also finished one of the starters' exercises, that begins with a simple drawing, which is filled up with colour, then washed out with water and a sponge so that the colours fade, and after it has dried, "volume" is suggested by painting on top of it, with highlights, shadow and patterns (for more info see our watercolour book)

The volume exercise by Helen Bate

The volume exercise by Horst Timmermans

Dried Rose by Sandra Seymour-Dale

Stage one of a flock of sheep by photographer du jour Cathie van der Stel: the nice green elements on their backs are of course masking fluid...and they will have four legs, or maybe five...

Next week the finished project!

Spring Flowers

2010-05-14T23:08:00.002+02:00

Dancing flowers by Helene van der Kroft

Last week I brought a bunch of irises from my garden... here's an impression of what the aquarellista's made out of that!

Wonderful still life with Irises and other wild flowers, composed by Anna-Karin Fast in her characteristic direct style

Very subtle Iris painted wet-in-wet by Marina Teding van Berkhout

Brenda Moorhouse, back from the Isle of Man created a biggee - and considers it as a work in progress. But now that I see it, I wonder if it is not just right as it is now...

Lovely and happy bunch of irises by Lies Timmermans: Mysterious background to be added next session!!

"Newvby" Horst gave the iris a try too - and everybody agreed that it looks promising - very promising!

Cathie van der Stel felt like painting from the top of het head - and painted several, amongst them these poppies...

...and these...

...and a couple of gorgeous pink roses, that by the way look as if they are drifting in the water...

>> Scroll down for more aquarellista posts

Carribbean Blues II

2010-05-14T22:33:00.001+02:00

Two weeks ago my computer crashed and I didn't post - I still owe you the results of our second session on the "Carribbean Blues"

Peaceful Beach by Ann Edwards

Parasol and deckchairs by Betty Schep

Boat 1 by Cathie van der Stel

Boat 2 by Cathie van der Stel - and LOOK at that underwater part!!!
Click on the picture to enlarge and appreciate the detail and wonderful colours...

Boat in typical Helene van der Kroft style: lovely summer colours!

Scroll down for an impression of the vernissage of the Abstract Exhibition on Nice Airport...

Nice Airport Vernissage

2010-05-14T20:52:00.000+02:00

Last Saturday, the exhibition 'Les Abstraits' was officially opened! It was very well visited as you can see on the picture below!

The artists were introduced by the organisation and the attaché culturel de La Gaude. The nice looking guy on my left is Olivier Menu whose explosive art was printed on the invitation:

The art was also visible on the monitors!

This exhibition is on until the 30st of July, in both business centers, of Terminal 1 and 2...

Carribbean blues

2010-05-03T21:09:00.002+02:00

Inspired by Cathie's holiday, we started thinking about paintings with a Carribbean "feel"... It was great and sunny outside, it was Horst's birthday and we had homemade pear cake and champagne: what more could an aquarellista ask for!! Even without painting, it would have been a fabulous Tuesday afternoon, but we actually started some great paintings that look like they will catch that athmosphere just right:

Unfinished but already very Carribbean-looking! From Lies Timmermans

Work in progress, with still lots of masking fluid on mast and far-away sail, but look at that sky!!

Cathie van der Stel's two promising aquarelles...

Since 2 weeks ago, we have three enthousiastic newbees in the group: Mia, Horst and Helen. They are working very hard at the moment, to understand the difficulties of working with the transparent aquarelle paint, that doesn't allow you to make mistakes, that is so fluid that it flows and drips and stains, also when they do not want it.. But I am very confident that we can sho some results soon! Great things are already happening...

Horst's version of the "don't look at the shapes, just paint the colours"- exercise

NB: Scroll down to the next post for info about the "ABSTRAIT" show in Nice Airport!

Exhibition of Abstract work in Nice Aéroport

2010-05-03T21:02:00.003+02:00

Until 30 July the business centres of Terminal 1 and 2 of the airport of Nice, shows abstract work "L'Abstrait". There are marble and other stone sculptures, original 3D objects made out of plexiglass and of course paintings and drawings, in all kinds of media. Acrylics, oils, fresco, laquer, gouache, ink and a couple of aquarelles... yep, they're mine.

I've been there all morning to put up my work (6 paintings in total) it was of course great fun to be there and meet the other artists! Catherine Monmarson was there, Michel Baudet, Hannelore Jüterbock, all great artists and very nice and creative and their work is fantastic! OK, not in watercolours, but hey! That's why you have me in there, as your aquarellista representative...

Anyway - If you are in the neighbourhood, go and have a look and if you are in the neighbourhood on May 8th around 6 PM, that's even better: you are most welcome to join us for the festive vernissage!

Tattoo hands (and more)

2010-04-26T22:38:00.001+02:00

Like last time, the aquarellista's were going for a project where we were to be inspired by volcano's... and like last week we ended up doing something entirely different! But whatever the results were (euh, pretty good actually!) we could paint them outside, in the sun! and that alone was inspiration enough!

Lies Timmermans painted an interesting fantasy landscape - clearly with a volcano in mind...

And the rest...

Horst, Mireille, Marianne and Ann painted their own hands - than added home-designed tattoos, for a beautiful, mysterious effect.

Ann Edwards' tattooed hand

Mireille Bonneaud's subtle, mysterious version

Marianne van Wijngaarden's very oriental looking hand - note the gorgeous background, created with salt!

And last but not least the hand of Horst Timmermans (new and promising aquarellista!)

My only remark is about the "finishing" of the hands: they will have to come from somewhere, an arm, or out of a sleeve. That way the hand will look less like something found in an episode of CSI...

And then there were lots of other things going on! I'll keep some of that for next week's post. We had visitors again, this time two very talented youngsters, Samira and Maurice, who created several free, experimental aquarelles! Two of those are printed below:

...Maurice painted the circle of life...

and Samira first painted a great wet-in-wet background, and then added this lovely, funny cat!

Portraits in aquarelle V

2010-04-19T22:43:00.001+02:00

Last week we got together again after the break, and the idea was to use vulcano eruptions as inspiration for a bit of abstract work... but somehow everybody present felt like working on portraits once more! So... that's just what we did - although Sandra created a very interesting multimaterial vulcano, using silkwrapping paper to give the image a bit more relief:

And then we had two guests, the niece and daughter of oil painter Véronique Vandenhoeck!

The two had no experience in painting, but clearly had talent!! Amazing work:

And then some more portraits!

Sandra Seymour-Dale has been working for weeks on her very interesting project where she painted (several copies of) parts of her face and then combinig those parts to something that resembled her! She ended up tearing the parts in even smaller parts, and created two interesting, fauvist portraits, of which the middle one actually looks like her! And apart from the result, this was also about the process, it was such fun to do, and to watch! And also a very good idea for other aquarellista's...

Mireille Bonnaud thoroughly studied the characteristics of the iris

Before she painted the gorgeous eyes of this feline!!

Bibbi Isaksson worked on two interesting, promising portraits that weren't finished: I'll show her end product in the next post, with hopefully... some inspired abstract work, related to volcano's...

The Second Hangar Watercolour Book

2010-04-12T00:46:00.002+02:00

From time to time I give a workshop for aquarelle starters in our atelier Le Hangar.
To avoid having to print all that material every time, I combined it all into a book... The cover page is a painting by Sandra Seymour-Dale and the picture on the back shows our Aquarellista! group...
The book (40 pages) contains exercises for 5 afternoons, as well as a lot of worthwhile hints and tips.

Below you can look inside a couple of pages by way of preview - give it a minute to load...
I look forward to your comments!

The 2nd Hangar Watercolour Book by Marina Kulik | BOOK INFO

Portraits in aquarelle IV

2010-04-05T22:50:00.001+02:00

Last week - Last portrait session, not many aquarellistas, yet excellent results!
Below just a little show of what we did... Enjoy!

The not-yet-final multi portrait of Sandra Seymour-Dale. She is developing it further, cutting in parts, maybe tearing and then composing a new portrait from the pieces!! Very interesting project...

Sandra also painted a portrait of her friend Janet. Less experimental than the kaleidoscope one, but note the excellent upper left and right the beautiful effects of the use of salt in wet paint...

Ann Edwards finished her portrait of the Venus of Milo

Anna Karin Fast finished the portrait of her beautiful granddaughter.

Cathie van der Stel started another impressive "fauvist" portrait.

Portrait of a boy, Marina Teding-van Berkhout has a commission and practised the most difficult part, his hair: we could give input and help and as you can see she can completely trust her abilities!!

Portraits in aquarelle III

2010-03-29T23:24:00.002+02:00

Beautiful granddaughter by Anna-Karin Fast

Five aquarellista's present last time we got together, and we produced as if we were ten...

Look at the results of only one afternoon!! I can actually report two parallel developments, one on the creation of realistic portraits, the initial objective of this "theme"... Anna Karin Fast started the aquarelle above, in her characteristic, light, direct and spontaneous style.

Ann Edwards' "Venus of Milo"

Ann Edwards concentrated on the lightfall and the representation of marble, as well as the typical features of the famous sculpture - we hope to see the finished product next week!

Bibbi Isaksson created a 'double portrait', from an old black and white picture of herself and her husband on holiday. She is still working on it, developing and researching until she finds the final shape. She experiments with photoshop:

I love the right-side eye! and the humor in the photoshop version...

Sandra Seymour-Dale and Cathie van der Stel experimented too, with portraits and colour, look at the fascinating results - to be continued for a long time!!

This is what 'the making of' looks like. Water, palettes, brushes, salt, kitchenpaper - and lots of tea!

Cathie van der Stel's latest version of her 'guy with a cold'

And another guy by Cathie

Note how natural he looks, despite the green, purple and blue! Fauvism in aquarelle portraits, it works! To be developed, as Cathie is definitely on the way of discovering something really worthwhile.

Sandra Seymour Dale's kaleidoscopic self portrait version 1

The idea was to arrange the separate pieces, put them on top of each other, to form one face. But that didn't make it stronger.

Sandra Seymour Dale's kaleidoscopic self portrait version 2

The project is not yet over, but arranging the pieces in the way shown above gives much more information on the person than a regular portrait. I think it is a great idea...

Next week: the finished results...more portraits! And then we'll go for something abstract again. On large sizes. And hopefully in great, sunny, warm, South French weather!

Portraits in aquarelle II

2010-03-22T22:46:00.002+01:00

In our second session of the "portraits" project, we discussed the characteristics of light and shadow and creating skin colour.

After carefully writing down every colour I used to paint my hands, I discovered that "yellowish" combined with "pinkish" always give reasonable skin colour. You add more or less water to achieve lighter and darker colours and use payne's grey, other blueish tones or sepia for the shadow.

And as for shadow on a face in aquarelle: don't make it too light! Aquarelle paint becomes lighter when it dries, and the shadow part is 40% darker than the lightest colour. A good way to build up your portrait, is to start with the 'highlights', draw them with pencil if you like, or use masking fluid. Next, mix the lightest skincolour and paint the whole face with it, apart from the highlights of course.

When that's dried, add the shadow. And when that's dried, you add all the other colours for eyes, hair, lips, cheekbones, freckles etc...

Like Ann Edwards did with her portrait of Louise:

This interesting information was used by the other participants, Renée, Cathie and Sandra on their work, of which I didn't take too many pictures! But here's the next stage of Sandra's fauvist puzzle-selfportrait.

Believe me, she looks much friendlier in real life!!

And Cathie had good fun with a fauvist experiment that turned out great if you ask me. Amazing how blue eyebrows, green skin and purple lips can look so acceptable!

Although Cathie feels this guy has so much colours because of his very wet sneezy cold!

Portraits in Aquarelle

2010-03-15T21:31:00.001+01:00

Our aquarellista group has embarked on a four-week "portrait" project... We started with a selfportrait.

The paintings you can admire below are a great start and an example of our different styles. Unfinished! -but I'll keep you posted on the progress...

Self portrait in kaleidoscopic version of Sandra SeymourDale

Cathie van der Stel worked on several portrait projects, (that I didn't take pictures of I'm sorry to say) but here's the beginning of her self portrait. I can recognise her from it!

Marie Dorveaux started on her self portrait with a lot of contrast! Look at the right eye - it reflects the sun in a beautiful way!!

Ann Edwards started not on a self portrait but on one of her granddaughter.

Aren't the eyes gorgeous and special!

Can't wait to see the finished paintings next week...

The beauty of folds...

2010-03-08T22:40:00.000+01:00

A very beautiful and inspiring subject - and also a difficult one - is folded fabric. So last week we did a bit of research on satin and velvet scarves. It was great fun - and the first results are pretty promising!

Satin by Cathie van der Stel, Ann Edwards and Mireille Bonnaud (in that order)

and the Marina's who did give "velvet" a try:

Pink velvet shawl - to be finished - by Marina Teding van Berkhout

Silk scarf with black velvet by Marina Kulik

It was great fun - and we also did other stuff, which you can admire in the post below....

Views and Violets

2010-03-08T22:35:00.003+01:00

We had a couple of projects to finish last week, before we started with the "folded fabric". Sandra Seymour-Dale worked on three paintings at the same time, one of those this stunning wave. She set it up with masking fluid, for the foam. One of the things you can hardly paint without a masking product. Using it you can work impulsive and wet in wet while preserving the movement and spontaneous character of the white parts. As you can see Sandra did a fantastic job here! She also used salt - with moderation- if you enlarge the picture you can clearly see the effect in the bottom left hand corner.

She also worked on the Cinqueterre idea, and used it as an inspiration for some architectural aquarelles...

Cathie van der Stel finished her version of Manarola - it has truly worked out into a stunning picture! Composition and colours and patience and antmosphere - all great!!

And Marina Teding van Berkhout painted velvet (see post above) and violets! Note that she first painted the violets, then covered them with masking fluid and painted the background, wet in wet. After removing the masking fluid she balanced the total picture and this is the result

Cinqueterre II

2010-03-01T22:23:00.003+01:00

Cathie, Marianne, Marie, Mireille and Sandra were the Aquarellista's present last week...

They worked in two "shifts" - made autonomous work and worked on the next stage of the manarola Cinqueterre project... The picture above gives a nice impression of our atelier Le Hangar!

Lovely aquarelle by Cathie van der Stel

Intriguing watercolour of an old Indian by Marie Dorveaux

and a very interesting version of the "four washes" exercise by Mireille Bonnaud. Note the UFO?

Poppy by Marianne van Wijngaarden

I am told that Sandra created a wonderful portrait - as a gift for a friend - but there is no picture I'm afraid... Maybe next week!

...Sandra must have been on a roll - she also made a fascinating start with her village ...

And last but not least this one! I suspect it is Cathie's...

Thanks to Cathie who organized, took the pictures and went back to switch off the lights of the atelier!

Tomorrow I'll join the group again and we'll start a project on fabrics like velvet and satin! Expect the results in later posts...

Manarola Cinqueterre

2010-02-22T23:17:00.000+01:00

Bibbi Isaksson's Manarola "collage"

In last week's aquarellista session we actually all worked on the same subject - a pretty Italian-looking village, with very brightly coloured houses, on a cliff. We didn't know where is was as we worked from a picture that came from a presentation... But we all had our suggestions of what it would be: I thought it might be Elba, Cathie suggested Portofino " Cinque terre maybe and Bibbi thought it might be Riomaggiore in Cinque terre... After our painting session the detective work on google started and it turned out that it was the lovely village of Manarola in Cinqueterre... Bibbi as well as Cathie found it... and it is as colorful as the picture... Anyway... Most of us didn't finish the project yet. That is because a painting like this (with perspective, many different colors, light, shadow and contrast) requires a lot of work!! This was the picture we used as inspiration:

And here are the first brushstrokes (bad pictures taken with my phone, sorry) They are actually quite good! Looking back I am happily surprised, also to see those different styles and impressions!

As a very experienced house - and village painter I would like to mention here that an aquarelle of a subject like this needs patience and perseverance, in other words: work!

It often starts quite boring and will get its rhythm and volume and beauty only after you have put in all those shadows and (suggestions of ) windows, roofs, plants and other details...

So if you are not happy with your half-finished village, don't tear it up yet! Be patient, persist and finish it! It may become one of your nicest paintings...