Aquarelle Watercolours Tuesday 29 May 2 - 4.30

Flora & Fauna

Because I was travelling, there was no time to post about the work of the Aquarellistas last week. That's why you get an overview of what we did the past 2 weeks right here...

Anna-Karin Fast

Above you see an abstracted impression of a plant by Anna-Karin. As you can see she uses different contrasts and colour combinations: she has been painting outside, with a Swedish artist (the name escapes me - I will give it to you later) and she has learnt a couple of new techniques that she promises to share with us when she returns from Sweden.

Sandra Seymour-Dale

Sandra is studying this subject, interesting in many respects, the effect of light through the fence, the shadows, the contrast... It is not yet quite finished but it deserves to be seen in this stage!

Barbara Kinsella

Brenda's twin sister Barbara visited us last week - and although she has no experience whatsoever with aquarelle (or painting in general) she clearly has the talent of her sister! Shown above are her waterlilies - very well done!

Cathie van der Stel

This lovely happy (smiling?) horse was painted by Cathie, with the help of masking fluid and salt, which gives it the 'ruffled feathers' look...

Agnès McLAughlin

And last but not least, here's the peacock that Agnès painted, as an experiment: she used a 'dripping' technique, where you hardly have control, which means more risk, but the result is spontaneous and original! And as you can see it worked out very well - I also love the background - the yellow on the right hand side has a very thin wash of paynes's grey over it, which suggests distance... the yellow also works well as a good contrast with the violet of the bird...

And then to top it all off - a couple of 'before and after' images! ☺

...See what a bit of shadow can do! One of the first illustrations for our future cookbook, a recipe for 'Fleurs de Courgette' by Edith Alborni...

...Same here - with a very thin wash of Payne's Grey, Lesley Bufton made her already interesting parasol a very beautiful composition - that feels like it really protects you from the sun...

 ...And here you see Mieke van Papen's rhythm of glass bottles! With the background added, you believe that they are for real - transparent and subtle...

Aquarelle Tuesday from 2 - 4.30pm

Colourful Parasols

Last week Tuesday it was a glorious day and despite the 'changing light' (because the sun moves) Georgie, Liz and Agnes did their painting outside (and thoroughly enjoyed it).

The theme du jour was 'parasols' once more and Georgie worked hard on hers:

Georgina Hole's finished parasols

a transparent aquarelle with lots of permanent rose and 'homemade' violet...

Mieke van Papen worked on these beauties,

the green parasol is finished and like Georgie's it is a true aquarelle, poetic and light. 

This complicated inside of a parasol by Lesley Bufton isn't finished

but already interesting, graphic and super well done!

The other parasols will be shown next week - there was also a lot of activity on our calendar - the months April, May and December are finished, and July, August and October are halfway - looking great!!

And there is another project we are slowly and surely progressing with: our cookbook...

Lesley tweaked her tomato sauce recipe and created this perfect picture

Cathie van der Stel has experimented with gorgeous colour combinations and salt

and she ended up with truffles!

Aquarelle Tuesday

Colourful Creations

In our aquarelle session of last week we worked around two themes (parasols and recipes for our Aquerellista cookbook), we finished ongoing projects, proceeded with the calendar and we welcomed two new girls, Gaby and Rose-Marie! A busy and productive afternoon - and everything was about 'colour'! The theme du jour was 'Parasols'. I brought colourful pictures (and real ones - but forgot to show them) and the results were in one word great!

Agnes McLaughlin -original as always- used her own input, one picture for the colours and one for the subject, and painted these lovely little girls with parasols. (Love their little feet!!)

 Georgie Hole hasn't finished hers but it is already so good!!

Lesley started a very difficult construction of a beautiful parasol, more about that next time and Cathie worked on these lovely old fashioned ones:

...and finished this STUNNING basket with pinecones.

Edith Alborni finished her  'mysterious girl with peacock feather'. Isn't is gorgeous?!

In the meantime, work on our recipes goes on. Lesley Bufton works on her tomato sauce ingredients. She experimented with salt on the orange worktop but washed it out again as she wasn't happy with the result. Looks like it might be finished this week!

Lesley Bufton's tomato sauce ingredients. Just some very small adjustments needed and then it's good to go (into our cookbook). The golden bottletop is very well done by the way!

Agnes McLaughlin made the first breakfast illustration for the cookbook. Lots of fun in this as usual. The pinapple originally was a cookie, also note the Porridge bowl and all the handy signs ... The tablecloth with distorted perspective contrasts so nicely with the elegant china! And the silver is very well done...

Aquarelle Tuesday from 2 - 4.30

The Aquarellistas - hard at work

Last Tuesday our group took a day off, due to the 'Fête du Travail', but the week before we had a great afternoon with several highlights!

One of them our Aquarellista pal Bibbi Isaksson who has moved to Sweden but visits France from time to time - so she could join us last session!! Everybody was delighted to see that she hadn't changed one bit (well, she was less tanned than we are of course) and that she didn't loose her talent...

Roly and Lesley were back too, and Lesley worked very hard on her Carnival de Venice Picture - with a remarkable and super detailed result!

Impressive - and expressive Carnival picture by Lesley Bufton... What a patience that girl has!!

Beverley is back from the US - and with an amazing speed and accuracy produced the painting that Cathie, Anna-Karin, Sandra and myself had created for the Café Culture Expo... OK, slightly smaller, but still...

Bev's version of the Carnival's parade

A great bridge to the other work is Edith Alborni's feather girl. This painting is not yet quite finished but it has the mysteriousness of the masks. It is very well done, although there was a little worry with the masking fluid that she used on the plumes, that was very hard to remove. But with an eraser and a lot of perseverance (read very hot fingers of the continued rubbing) it worked out well and as you can see it is sensational!

Feather Girl by Edith Alborni...Look at that eye!

Brigitte Jansen is working on an image of a crocodile for two weeks now, she's been researching the effects of the background by using another medium - pastel crayons...

Both pastel and aquarelle version look pretty cool!!

Roly is the proud painter of this beautiful aquarelle of the yacht 'Sea breeze'. 

And we close today's post with the work-in-progress by Cathie van der Stel.

THis beautiful still life (that will no doubt be finished soon) is just an exercise for things to come... The aquarellista cookbook for instance...

Poetic Pine Cones by Cathie van der Stel

Carnaval de Venise - a project in aquarelle

Lots of great work again last Tuesday...! We have started a project inspired on Lesley Bufton's visit to Venice - where the carnival happened to be in full swing!! She had exciting pictures - that unfortunately were a bit too small yet gave us plenty of ideas and we found what we were looking for on the internet. Some of us worked on their own pictures:

Brigitte Jansen on her way to finish another very interesting and deep aquarelle!

Most striking is the mask but also interesting that she has used lots of salt on the hat, with a refined effect (much salt gives little dots, a few grains give big shapes)

Lesley Bufton started on an ambitious - and very cool - picture of an 'Arlequino'...

Helene van der Kroft created on a composition of two masks...

And then there was teamwork! We are making two really big paintings - with 4 artists. This means constant communication, on sizes, measurements and colours, quite a challenge!

Liz Douglas and Edith Alborni started a wonderful picture in flaming colours... They hope to be joined by two more painters coming Tuesday...

 And the second team painting by Sandra Seymour-Dale, Anna-Karin Fast, Cathie van der Stel and Marina Kulik

It already looks super if you ask me - coming Tuesday we'll try to finish most of the work and you can actually check all this out on the next Café Culture (Wednesday 21 March), when we'll exhibit them - and more aquarelles - in the Hangar!!

Smart use of cling film

Sometimes it is such fun to use other materials in your aquarelle! For instance: cling film. It gives an effect that would be hard to create with a brush, it is lively, spontaneous and you can never be completely sure what it ends up like... Mmm sounds like aquarelle watercolours! It is a great way to fill up a background if you want it to be interesting but not too dominant. Many have experimented with it and last week Agnès tried it for her 'collage girl'

Make a wet -in-wet background, with lots of pigment(s) and put wrinkly cling film on it.
Let dry (in the air, don't use a hairdryer) carefully take the film off and behold the result:

Collage Girl by Agnès McLaughlin

At the same time Roly worked hard and steady on his own -perfectly drawn!- boat:

Roly Bufton's yacht

He is visiting her this week so high expectations for an all-inspired finishing of this project...

Brigitte finished her original scarf - she has now achieved mastery in folds and stripes!

 Brigitte Jansen's bedouine-like image of a scarf



There is also a lot of good work in progress - Cathie van der Stel started the last part of her series of sea beasts - a lobster (they really come in spectacular colours but this one is coloured according to Cathie's imagination...), Mieke van Papen began with an abstract looking jellyfish, Edith Alborni worked on a picture of a running leopard, Lesley Bufton almost finished a very happy painting of a couple of  ducks (or geese?) and Lies Timmermans started a promising graphical nude... I hope to show you all that next week!

We finish with Edith Alborni's creative take on last week's subject:

Edith Alborni



Aquarelle Tuesdays 2 - 4.30pm - Marina Kulik

Miniatures and Magnifications

50x70 cm Seahorse by Cathie van de Stel - Mindblowing!!

Cathie actually received applause when she showed this during the evaluation last Tuesday. Believe me, the photo doesn't do it justice, this aquarelle has a perfect balance between colour, experiment, light, dark, fun, depth and mystery. And as you can guess, it is an enlargement of the real thing - the size of a seahorse or hippocampus varies between 1 and 20 centimeters...

Our challenge du jour (and for the coming weeks) was to take a colourful picture or still life, and create a composition with a miniature of the whole thing and then a magnification as the background. Most of us have started and not yet finished - and it already looks spectacular so I'd like to share two morre with you:

Mini and Maxi parrot - beautiful work in progress by Georgina Hole 

Miniature of ivy with berries - painted from a still life and  to be continued tomorrow by Brigitte Jansen

And there was other pretty impressive and interesting painting going on...

'Portrait of a woman'  by Sandra Seymour Dale

A very characterful portrait with an interesting symbolism. Note how the chicken wire (imprisonment) changes into flying birds (freedom) and the vague silhouette of a man, partly in front of the woman (taking her light) -  Have a long look at it and give it your own interpretation... super interesting!

Agnes McLaughlins' colourful chickens (their names: Oh, La and La) 

A super happy & funny picture with a whole different use of chicken wire (in white crayon) and I particularly like how the eyes are done... Click on the picture to enlarge

Lesley Bufton's Tropical house with Palm Tree

Lesley had a good old struggle to get the background in the colour she wanted, and after a first wash of ochre did a second of ultramarine with a little bit of carmine - and then another one, which did the trick! It's not finished but you can already see the tropical atmosphere (with a rainstorm coming?) and the light and dark is remarkable...

'Tunnel' by Anna-Karin Fast

Anna-Karin finished the 'tunnel' image - which worked out very well! Then started with a big cat. She used masking fluid for the whiskers. This will make them stand out in a spontaneous background... As usual Anna-Karin painted this picture in just a few brush strokes. Here's a preview:

Roly Bufton finished his picture with little fishing boats in it - and will soon embark on a painting project that has to do with a big boat (his own). But for the time being he painted a dune, in 15 minutes and it actually looks great!

Edith Alborni finished her 'Collage' in sepia

and then moved on to 'Woman with a colourful shawl' whom I will dedicate a blogpost to after she finishes. We have enough versions now, all based on the same picture and very very different!

And the last two contributions are from Liz Douglas (who is actually working on a very interesting painting of the village Plascassier) and Judith Kuiper. They both washed aquarelle paint off their painting, Judith to make it lighter and work further on it and Liz because she was unhappy with the left part of her otherwise wonderful still life:

Phase 1 and 2 of Liz Douglas's metallic still life. Part washed out and then 'repaired'. Spot the differences! (click to enlarge)

Judith Kuipers'  Abstract Bird - all washed out and ready for the next layer...