1dailypainting.com

“nude with owls” - mixed media, 25×30 cm

This is one of my latest life drawings. I notice that I always use the same colours with watercolours, although quite a variety with acrylics and oils. Why? Don’t know. Payne’s Grey is one of my favourites. Something between dark blue, grey, a hint of purple… mysterious.

Sometimes lighting conditions are such that you can’t really make out brighter and darker areas. This can be especially difficult with back perspectives, as nothing much seems to “happen” there…

Therefore a strong light source and darker areas are even more important with these poses, creating more dramatic effects on the body.

Our group has got a few more artists, which means more interesting variety. We all enjoy the concentrated, intense atmosphere during the two and a half hours, which is actually quite short.

I am still trying to work out the right washes of pigments for light and shade painting the human figure with watercolours. Question is, how precise or abstract should it be? It’s trial and error, I suppose… And of course, copying from  masters, such as Schiele, Rodin. And then, there is the question of a suitable background. Not too dominant or too exvited, but still giving the impression of underground.

This time I decided to post about some sculptures I did a while ago. They were all inspired by acient art - either egyptian or greek, and all ceramics.

I am trying to convince myself that with a lot of practise, my watercolour nudes might improve. Still not sure if this is the right medium for me. But - it’s fun.

I have worked on two of my watercolour paintings. Obviously, with this medium, it is much more difficult to remove or correct wrong bits. But this is a nice new challenge. I try to get inspired by work of watercolour artists I admire - such as Egon Schiele or (contemporary) Shirley Trevena. Let’s see …!

This time it’s watercolour - just to try a different medium. I still have to practise a lot with them…

colourful pastels on dark blue pastel paper, short poses
again, life-drawing on pastel paper