Wolves, Flowers and Fruit - Tuesday 27 October - Zen Watercolour afternoon in the Hangar

Really Stunning Tulips by Sandra

Music - check, Tea - Check, Cookies - Check! On top of that Agnès brought Cider-with-not-so-much-alcohol and fabulous coconut cake for her birthday. All that, combined with a group of enthusiastic users of our transparent watery flowy capricious medium - what can go wrong... Nothing! Everything was exactly right - and better. (is that possible?) Here's what we did that afternoon:

 Unwrapped Pears by Cathie

 Amazing Still Life by Liz - she created this watercolour while managing the plumbers in her house 2 weeks ago. Now that's the right kind of multi-tasking!

On that date (Liz missed out) we had a visit from a man who fights for the protection of wolves in our area.

He had 2 real ones in the back of his car (very friendly, we were allowed to pet them - but huge, and dangerous if you don't know how to handle them). This was very impressive and of course it inspired some of us!

 She-wolf in the snow by Edith - what a character!

 Almost finished - wolf peeking through the birches by Liz

Foxy wolf by Agnes 

Funny to see that if you add the colour red to the fur of the wolf, it becomes foxy! I'm sure it is the brain that does that :)

The starter group was not allowed to be inspired, they had to work on the layers-exercise: Create this view from the river in 4 layers... First the sky with stars (dark blue and leave out the stars - difficult!)

Wait until dry, then colour the orange layer for the windows and the river. Leave out whites for the reflection of the stars... When dry, paint the buildings, leaving out orange squares and rectangles to suggest illuminated windows, and then create light waves in the water leaving out the reflecion of the stars...

They did really well!!

 Sylvie's creation after 3 layers. She has painted a 'Paquebot' instead of a city. Do you see it?

 Cora did a very good job here. She is now working with us from Italy and as soon as she's settles in she will send pics of her results!

Carol's lovely painting - with reflection of the stars scratched out. Great effect!

 (funny how all three are done exactly the same way and all three are still so different)

Next time another layer-exercise, with more room for imagination. Linda and Carol have already started, and their paintings look very promising! Watch this space for more next week!

Diversity in aquarelle

 On Tuesday 21 October, the Aquarellista group had a session again. Without Patience who will be away until March/April... Brenda was there for the last time until May 2016 and next time is Cora's last as she moves to Italy... luckily we have this blog, and email!!

Brenda made up for her coming absence by producing a series of abstract, cubistic watercolours. I was going to make a selection but I'm publishing all of them, they are so cool!!

And then on the other hand, Cathie was working on 3 radish-based paintings, of which I took 2 pictures. Fantastic and cool too - in quite another way!!

And then Sandra was back from a month absence - with her villages finished! Super interesting, beautiful and poetic... and personal style number 3!

... Edith worked on the theme - Red Landscapes -  and started a real interesting one... on Mars!

She also had some fun within the theme of 'Halloween':

 

As did Agnès, who created this amazing Jack'oLantern - it really gives light - and have you recognized the image cut in it??

And Agnès also finished her autumn tree! - So High...

Also the starters corner achieved lots!

Linda finished her 'layers' exercise and did a fantastic job! She really understands what that's about now and will start the background - foreground - details exercise (also layers)

Cora tried the marbles on a leftover sheet until she understood and then started her own set, to be finished at home... 20 colourful marbles! 

After this exercise she has practiced almost everything there is to know!!

 Interested too? If you want to know more you can have a look at our exercisebook here (it has a preview function)

Aquarellistas' trees & misc...

Apart from the fishy still life (see below), we all worked on other paintings too! Cathie's last-week theme, the 'amazing Trees' had some more -amazing- results:

  A stunning rainbow Eucalyptus tree by Edith. These trees really exist!

 And birchtrees in the snow , also by Edith

(click on the pictures to enlarge it)

Detail of Anna-Karin's first brush strokes, with her typical granulating Mars black.

Can't wait to see that develop!

Patience made this dancing tree, with automatic-writing details. It has a mysterious light - and will get a darker and more connected trunk and branches in the next session...

And last but not least this very fauvist impressionist tree, created by Liz

So far for the amazing trees - but still that wasn't all!! How about this 'Miscellaneous':

This is such a cute image - and well painted! by Agnès

Brenda's strawberry received a new background and is now perfect!

Another gorgeous rusty-lock challenge for Cathie. 

Inspired by the rainbow eucalyptus by the look of it ☺

Remember the Sunny Beaches of a couple of weeks ago? 

Agnès created one in absence and look how gorgeous it is!!

 After the asessment exercise with the primary & secundary colour scheme, Cora painted this delicate abstract...

...and still had time left to start with the 'washing' exercise - which looks very promising by the way!