Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 9

Here’s the do over from yesterday. I left this version much more open which gives it a more clear look. It still could use some tinkering but for now on to new sites!

Amsterdamse Bos/ Amsterdam Forest, bistre & pencil, 24 x 30 cm

Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 8

Confession, I don’t draw one drawing a day, I do 2 to 4. This way I can work ahead to cover things like  rainy days.

The drawing of today is from yesterday. I knew it was going to be a huge challenge. There’s a lot of (murky) water and not much sunlight. I feel like I totally lost control on this one.

Today I went back to have another try. I’ll post the result of the do over tomorrow.

Amsterdamse Bos/ Amsterdam Forest, bistre & pencil, 24 x 30 cm

Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 7

Another view of the waterside I drew yesterday.

I really enjoyed drawing these two drawings. From a drawing perspective but also because something happened that made me grin every 15 minutes or so.

On the other side of the water there was a path a lot of dog owners used for their walk. Around every 15 to 30 minutes I would hear a big splash and more sloshy sounds and a dog owner either going berserk at their dog or start laughing hysterically because they used to have a clean and not so muddy dog.

Amsterdamse Bos/ Amsterdam Forest, bistre & pencil, 24 x 30 cm

Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 6

Amsterdamse Bos/ Amsterdam Forest, bistre & pencil, 24 x 30 cm

Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 5

Today a somewhat wider view of the spot I’ve been drawing for the last couple of days.

Amsterdamse Bos/ Amsterdam Forest, bistre & pencil, 24 x 30 cm

Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 4

Back at the same spot at the Amsterdam Forest as in my first 2 drawings.

Amsterdamse Bos/ Amsterdam Forest, bistre & pencil, 24 x 30 cm

Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 3

Usually I’m alone when I draw. During this drawing I was on a nature walk with a good friend and I learned that I can draw and chat at the same time!

Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen, bistre & pencil, 24 x 30 cm

Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 2

The first time I had to sit down and draw nature was during highschool. I say ‘had to’ because I didn’t like it at all!

My teacher was very pleased with the result but I wasn’t. To me nature was utterly chaos and I couldn’t decide what was important and what not, I didn’t feel like I was making well considered decisions what to draw and what to leave out.

Until this day I feel the same way about drawing (in) nature. There’s so much going on: branches, leaves, twigs, shrubbery, it’s just too much!!

But I do love nature. That’s why I decided that drawing outside in nature would be the challenge for the 30 Paintings in 30 Days challenge of this September.

Amsterdamse Bos/ Amsterdam Forest, bistre & pencil, 24 x 30 cm

Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days, September 2016 – Day 1

Last January I entered Leslie Saeta’s painting challenge: Thirty Paintings in Thirty Days.

It was a really good experience, I learned a lot and I ended up exhibiting all 30 paintings last April.

This September I’m having another go at the challenge.

This time I decided to be less strict. Leslie Saeta said it herself: there are no rules, just to have fun and ‘paint’ more than you would’ve if you didn’t participate. A ‘painting’ doesn’t strictly need to be a painting, it can be a drawing, a linocut, whatever your medium is.

For the month of September I’m going to draw in nature daily, mostly at the Amsterdamse Bos (Amsterdam Forest) and my ‘paintings’ will actually be drawings.

I found out about the challenge and Leslie Saeta through her podcast Artist Helping Artists which I highly recommend!!

Amsterdamse Bos/ Amsterdam Forest (24 x 30 cm)

Experimenting

Last couple of days I’ve been experimenting a bit with lines and layering.

This is an overview of the layering-experiment I did. I started with layer of thick, bright watercolours and then added pastels, charcoal and pencil.

More experiments coming up!

Sticks and Stones

When I started this blog I set out to share the good things and the bad things and now I’m about to share a ‘bad’ thing I hesitate… It’s hard to share when things don’t go as planned.
As some of you might know I’ve been battling a burn-out for some time now.

First I continued to work but after a while I had to stop and when I did, I started to fully comprehend how bad I was doing. Back then I wasn’t even able to do art, I wasn’t able to do much of anything.

Just recently the tax authorities got wind of me not making much money and I got invited for an appointment at their office. The burn-out had made sure I didn’t make much money of my art and couldn’t spend much time on my art either.

Because of that they ended up taking away my fiscal entrepreneurship status and they will be checking up on me in 2017.

The appointment was last week and I felt very bad after that. It took me a few days to feel better but yesterday I had a little help putting me in my place again.

The lady I had the appointment with called to run through what was said earlier and explain her findings. She repeated once again they would check up on me in 2017 and she added, because they were not very convinced any significant progress would be happening.

I’m sure the lady didn’t intend or realize it but these words felt like a right kick in the face.

But hey, ‘sticks and stones’, right?!

Window art: Roald Dahl & Quentin Blake

Most Roald Dahl-fans will know that on September 13^th 2016 it’s 100 years ago Roald Dahl was born and that the July 2016 premiere of Steven Spielberg's adaptation of Roald Dahl's The BFG (Big Friendly Giant) is no coincidence.
To celebrate these wonderful events the American Book Center Amsterdam asked me to paint a special Roald Dahl window in style of Quentin Blake’s art. I am both a Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake fan so I immediately said YES!

At home I made a small design of some of Dahl’s characters (almost) all being after Wonka’s Golden Ticket.

When it was time to paint the design on the window itself I first started sketching the characters in white. This to position them correctly and also provide a more rough surface so the next layer of colour paint would stick better and be less see through. When all this was done I used an acrylic marker for the line work that I drew on top of the acrylic paint.

So hop on over to the American Book Center Amsterdam to buy one of Dahl’s treasures and see my window live at the same time. As far as my window goes you can do so until July 14^th.

Open Studio Grafisch Collectief Thoets

Last weekend me and my colleagues at Grafisch Collectief Thoets had our open studio Sunday.

It was fun but compared to the exhibition weekend I organized last April it was soooo quiet…

At the end of the day I started doubting myself.

Was my work not good enough? Maybe the way it was displayed on the wall wasn’t working?
Or maybe the art didn’t work well together…

Also I find it very challenging to divide time between all of my different guests: friends, family, old customers, potential new customers… Maybe I did it all wrong!

Maybe I did some of these things wrong, maybe, but then I thought I just had this big show in April, people had just seen me (and my art).

Also we started promoting the event quite late, only 2 weeks ahead of time.

Next to our event there was a lot happening that weekend, a big comic festival in Haarlem, the start of Terschellings theatre festival Oerol and probably much more…

Today there was a new episode of a podcast that I like, the Creative Pep Talk by Andy Miller and the theme of the show fitted perfectly: Breaking Through (creative) Anxiety.

Or as Miller puts it: ‘Creating from a place of anxiety is like trying to plant a garden on concrete.’