"Outside" in Chateauneuf

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...

Spring Flowers

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

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...

Christmas Expo in Chateauneuf

And the aquarellista's are exhibiting again! From the 11th until the 19th of December you can admire the aquarelles of Bibbi Isaksson, Birgitta Engvall, Sandra Seymour-Dale, Denise Holt, Cathie van der Stel and Marina Teding van Berkhout on the walls of the Mediathèque of Chateauneuf. Other work of those aquarellista's and the others is also lined up in a stand, and I can recommend browsing a bit: there are wonderful watercolours there (most of them have been published on this blog) that can be yours for (very!)  reasonable prices...

The opening hours are from 10 - 12 am and 14 - 17 pm.

The address: Rue du Pontis (next to the church) Chateauneuf de Grasse

Vases and water

The week before last we started with a still life of flowers in a vase filled with water. This led to the need for more research on water and glass:

The "breaking" of the object (like a stem of a flower) by the water...

Bibbi Isaksson

The composition of water, glass and flowers I:

Titia Brandwijk

The reflections of light in the glass:

Beverly (now back in the USA for a couple of months) 

The composition of flower and glass II:

Sandra Seymour-Dale

The reflection of the background in the glass:

Bibbi Isaksson
 

Reflection of the light in the water:

Lies Timmermans

The importance of contrast and background:Karin de Bruine

And then there is some work in progress, from Ann amongst others - to be shown next post...

View on the village

Detail of "View on St Tropez" by Cathie van der Stel & Marina Kulik

This post is not about a project the aquarellista's have done, this is about something we may do in the coming weeks! As we are going to participate in the second exhibition in the Salle Pontis in Chateauneuf - because they really wanted us back - I 'd like to suggest to create all kinds of views of Chateauneuf... That could be the village itself, it is a truly lovely place, on top of a hill -

or we could also paint some of the many, absolutely fabulous romantic little streets inside the old center...

Below a couple of examples of views on villages - and we'll be back in two weeks with similar pictures, but now with Chateauneuf as subject!

View on St Tropez, the full painting by Cathie & Marina

Place des Arcades in Biot

View on Cannes

View on Antibes

Exhibition Bibbi Isaksson part I

Just got back from this fantastic exhibition in Valbonne, of aquarellista Britt-Marie (Bibbi) Isaksson!
For those of you who weren't able to go there and have a look: it was awsome, you really missed something... So instead of showing your paintings of our last session in the Hangar (I'll do that some other time) - I'll post a number of pictures of this show - in 2 chapters!

First of all: "people" - just look at the light and the shadows, and have you noticed that every single painting truly tells a story?
Well actually, some of the paintings have a story written next to them, like this one:

It even mentions us - because Bibbi got the inspirations to make the painting below, out of the statue and cat-eye-sessions that we did in the Hangar!This is the official version that she did later

...and as you can see, it has a tiny red dot in the right upper corner ...

What an atmosphere! of old movies and theatre plays...

More later!!

Reflections in aquarelle II

Last week most of the members of our Aquarellista group in the South of France busied themselves once more with the "reflection" theme - this time in convex mirrors... the effects are amazing - and worth looking into more often - we haven't approached the subject in a technical way - we just used the impression it made on us and painted that on the beautiful mould made paper with our transparent aquarelle paint!

Sandra Seymour-Dale with her graphical village reflected in a sphere...

...similar work from Brenda Moorehouse - with an "industrial" atmosphere...

...Beverly Ellsley created this wonderful still life with "jeu-de-boules" ball...

...here's another amazing picture from the hands of Ann Edwards!!! Isn't it wonderful! What an effect...as if it rolls from the paper...

And last but not least the poetic work of Anna Karin Fast - she gives the jeu-de-boule-balls a beautiful, peaceful character and if you look careful you can see the very subtle reflections!

Big Roses

Phew - last time I actually remembered to bring some examples of roses - and the aquarellista's present painted like crazy all afternoon!! We did a fabulous job, as you can see below:

Big Rose I by Cathie van der Stel

Big Rose II by Cathie van der Stel
(not yet finished - will be portrait or landscape together with another rose...)

Rose & broken heart by Birgitta Engvall

Lily by Bibbi Isaksson

(it is huge and still has "the light" - wonderful work)

Pink Rose by just-joined Aquarellista! Beverly Ellsly - great to have her as a new member

And I did 2 experiments, one "graphical" - monochrome with lines and surfaces only - is that still a rose? I think so...

And one in a non-rose colour. Still a rose, but a bit artificial looking..

Tomorrow we meet up again and will do vertical shapes and forms! More about that in the next post...