Eyes

Last week a small group of aquarellista's sat together for a nice and relaxed bit of painting, without result obligation, just for the inspiration and to have a good time... Despite that, the results were actually quite interesting:

Not quite finished but cuteness all over the place! Seal by AnnaKarin Fast

Beautiful eye of a snake also by AnnaKarin.

We played with transparent paint on paper with reptile eyes as inspiration.

Bibbi Isaksson did her own 'things', in this case a portrait in her own indistinguishable style

And a version 2 of her glass still life. Version 3 to be expected!

In beautiful colours, the eye of a gecko by Cathie van der Stel. Typical for her, a lot of detail, subtly painted in with unparalelled patience !

Marianne van Wijngaarden worked out "how-to" paint a birch tree. The result can be obtained in several ways, one of those... a credit card!

Aquarellista Start up

Last Tuesday die-hards Bibbi, Cathie, Marianne, Sandra and me started the new aquarellista-year without any form of bang... We set up a still life out of bottles, and Bibbi, Cathie and Sandra used that as input for their very personal impressions:

Bibbi Isaksson's still life. Loosely based on the original - but primarily made with her personal colours, shapes and typical atmosphere...

Same in Cathie van der Stel's version! Same input, different outcome (to be developed further...) with the brightest blue and a very interesting background

Sandra Seymour-Dale's colourful impression - note the festive champagne fountains! (Effect of salt on the wet paint)

Marianne van Wijngaarden and myself digged a bit deeper in the loose, wet-in-wet style that she would like to master! As it is a technique that I do not use for any other thing than backgrounds, where accuracy and control are not so important, I enjoyed to work together with her. We took as an example an aquarelle from http://www.watercolor.fr/ (another aquarelle blog).

For the wetin-wet part: lavender fields and a mountain - wet the surface and mix different diluted! shades of blue, lift the paint where it should be even lighter and add more pigment for the darker parts. Then a small farm with windows and trees (wet on dry).

And lots of white to be left out!

It was a good, simple exercise that combined colour mixing, controlled painting on a wet surface, keeping the result simple and spontaneous. Worthwhile doing and repeating!

Last part of the Triptych

Before we start again with the Aquarellista group I'd like to use this space to tell about a long (literally!) aquarelle project: I finally (after over10 years) finished it! Up to last month it existed of two parts that (typical for a lot of my abstract work) in itself was divided in parts. It was one of the first "DNA" paintings... every ribbon is symbolic for a "life"...

Those "lives" of course are pure imagination, they come out of my fantasy - but for me they are real and happening, some happy, others sad, some short, long, shallow, deep, colourful, monochrome, dancing, moving, still... all influenced by external events (water, the background, each other...). The 3 paintings are 1.50 meter high, I worked on loose sheets 300 grams torchon of  38 x 50 cm . Working on different pages has many advantages, for example, it is easier to take distance, when you work on several parts at the same time. No problem to work on a tiny coffee table if necessary, the size is manageable. Don't worry about making mistakes, you can start over and keep the other sheets that you were happy with. You can make better versions and, very interestingly, be inspired by your own work!

Anyway - I have been thinking about that final part of the triptych for a long time and finally last december I started -and finished it. Of course I have changed and made other choices while painting, the difference is very visible I think and even that gives inspiration (I might go back to that simpler way of working sometime)? Life, growth, development, combining, selecting, that is what the DNA paintings are about too. The work of an artist should be like that: constant learning, researching and developing... And it is very possible that this triptych will develop into 2 or three others! Or that left and right stay together and middle gets new neighbours... I'll keep you posted!

A Calendar for the new year!!

And...it's back to painting again :) our first aquarellista gathering will (maybe) take place next Tuesday, but that doesn't mean we're resting... I know for a fact that at least 4 of us are working really hard at the moment! Sandra, Marina TvB, Cathie and myself are painting against the clock, doing the best we can in representative portraits in aquarelle of naked women. They will be published next month, in a "Nudie Art Calendar" that will be sold for charity - Pink Ribbon. I have no pictures of the others yet, but I can show you some parts of what I did. Not the whole thing obviously - to see that -  you'll have to purchase a calendar for 25€ and support Pink Ribbon!

My model has gone through a lot, operations, chemotherapy, radiation, loosing her hair - but she has recovered - and how! She is one of the bravest women I know and I wanted to make a happy picture.

First of course the studies, sketching to get to know the person, the light, discover the best pose..

then carefully finding out the colours...

and then I (thought I) had it...

With this as a result

But then I tried some other perspectives... and this is what it ended up like for the calendar:

Happiness and freedom in sketch

And in aquarelle...

For the full images I refer you to the calendar - it will be presented somewhere in March (I'll keep you posted). In coming posts I'll show other calendar-paintings from the aquarellista's (of course only partly)

A great 2010 for all Aquarellista's!!

From the sunny (and cold) South of France I wish all aquarellista's and other readers
A VERY GOOD, BEAUTIFUL & CREATIVE NEW YEAR!!

"Les petits formats" in Valbonne

As mentioned in the post below, I am working on a couple of new ideas, and some of the studies for that are in the "petits formats" show in Valbonne.

"Perles" - a serie of studies inspired by the designs I am making for a dutch jewelry maker

"Solitaire" - not sure what this is going to develop into, but for now it is quite symbolic - silhouettes of women alone, with the wide wide world in front of, next and behind them

"Roses" as you may know them from me - only smaller sizes...

It is an exhibition organized by the Artothèque: fifteen of "their" artists show small size work, paintings, prints, sculptures, drawings, collages, raku -and aquarelles- for very attractive prices. It is very well visited and I have already sold 3 aquarelles- but there are still a lot left and the Christmas sales haven't started...

If you have time, make sure you go there and have a look, because apart from my petites aquarelles, there are also the necklaces that I design for the dutch brand Merrl TM (cost price!) and of course work of the other artists of the artothèque, amongst them well known ones like Sally Ducrow, Noël Monmarson and Daï from Nice.

There has already been a lot of publicity, two articles in Nice Matin, announcements on Riviera Radio and lots of attention in the local magazines.

"Fingerprint"

Anyway - whether you are just interested in what local artists create, want to invest in art or buy unique Christmas presents for your loved ones - you shouldn't miss this!! Go have a look in Valbonne, the expo is in the Salle Saint Esprit, next to the church. I will be there and happy to meet you all on Wednesday and off and on on the other days.

Free entrance from 10AM until 6PM every day until 24 December. NB: The famous Valbonne Christmas market starts the 22nd...

Xmas Exhibition in Chateauneuf part III

The exhibition in Chateauneuf is over - it was only there for a week. Our work - as well as that of the acrylics and oil artists was admired greatly by the mayor and other top dogs of Chateauneuf on their Christmas celebration. All visitors were positive and the membership of the Chateauneuf department of the International Women's club of the Riviera, who had their Christmas dinner between our paintings - was also very enthusiastic!

And now most of us are going to have their Xmas-holidays, in Sweden, Norway, England, Switzerland, Holland, Australia... And some are staying here and will go on painting! Me for example - I'll use the time off to start painting on large versions of some new ideas I've been working on... more about that in the next post... And here are some more pictures of the expo!

Provence village by Barbara Gentsch and  guy in a metro station by Örjan Rinnert

Bad pic of fabulous sculpture: Bird by Helen Bate

Three Nudes by Wim Teunissen, Betty Schep and Neville Moray...

and last but not least the real aquarellista thing:

Waterlilies by Cathie van der Stel and Denise Holt and

Chateauneuf in the snow by Marina Teding van Berkhout

Waterlily by Bibbi Isaksson, abstract by Birgitta Engvall

and Door in Chateauneuf by Sandra Seymour

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

Waterlilies & Chateauneuf part II

We worked really hard and concentrated last week - inspired by Riviera's Jazz Radio... Only one aquarellista didn't work on our suject du jour "waterlilies and  Chateauneuf":

Marina Teding van Berkhout, who made these beautiful studies of a female nude...

In the Waterlily section Denise Holt did another version of last week's first attempt after she hadn't touched an aquarelle brush for ten years...

Improvement clearly visible - although I also really liked the first one...

Cathie van der Stel finished hers... Isn't it fantastic!!

And so did Anna Karin Fast - she added some small touches and all of a sudden there is perspective in the picture!

This is a little in-betweeny by Anna Karin - painted while her other painting was drying.

A good idea, and sometimes the start of great works of art.

...~o0()0o~...

Ann hadn't been in for some time and started with a simple view of a street, with lots of contrast... and didn't it come out fine! She's ready for a good old Chateauneuf painting  if you ask me...

A lovely, subtle and poetic view on Chateauneuf by Cathie van der Stel - who else...

And the sunny side of the street - in Chateauneuf -  by Sandra Seymour-Dale

Coming Friday we 'll start putting up the paintings for the Chateauneuf exhibition - It opens the 12th of December and of course I'll update you about it!