Cats and birds

Two different basic designs for my wife's next stained glass window.

We have a long ceiling window in our lowered living room, looking out to the garden. Some decoration would be nice.
My wife choose the top one, which I worked out. I'll show the results in due time.

Blob

I was in Eindhoven this week, for work. During lunchbreak I made a walk to the center of town, and made this drawing on the market looking toward the old factory buildings of Philips on the Emmasingel, .
I was told the big blue building is called "the blob". That figures.
I made the drawing on location, but I had forgotten to bring the paint. Did that at home.

Timeline February

February 15th: I choose another news image.
(remember: I'll do this every 15th of each month this year. The series will be called Timeline and I hope that next December it will tell something of the past year).

February 15th: the world press photo awards were made public.
This one was amazing, won the 2nd prize in "on spot news".
The photographer Fabio Bucciarelli made this picture in Aleppo, Syria.
It tells about a fighter ready to kill, but also very jumpy and afraid of being killed.

Kasteel Hoensbroek

Acceptable weather this afternoon at last!
I passed our town's medieval castle (kasteel Hoensbroek) and thought, hey, it's about time to make an outdoor sketch again.
I have more or less lived across the street from this castle for 10 years, but only rarely drew it. Often you don't see the beauty from everyday presence around you any more.
A lesson in looking around.

This is the entrance gate to the first courtyard, with the smallest tower of the main building in the back. There are three courtyards in total, all separated by outbuildings, gates, bridges and deep moats.

Optocht Hoensbroek 2013

Carnaval is over for this year. Unfortunately I could not make any sketches during the outdoor activities and parades; it was far too cold. Your hands are frozen before you start, while looking at the parades.
This was the only sketch that I even tried, and I had to stop after a few pencil lines.
It's a float in the Hoensbroek parade; it features the youth prince of (I think) the soccer club in Passart (a part of Hoensbroek).
I noticed I drew the backside of the paper maché pencil-figure in an earlier sketch, made in the "optochthal", see a few weeks back,
http://www.renefijten.blogspot.nl/2013/01/noebele.html.

't is nieks en 't weurd nieks

Carnaval in our regions.
We went to a few parades on thursday (Kowrenne), saturday (Hoensbroek, the childrens parade), sunday (Maastricht) and today (Hoensbroek).
It was freezing cold this weekend, even a little snow and an icy wind.

I made this oil painting for my neighbours, who play in a zaate herremenie: 't is nieks en 't weurd nieks. (it's not good and it never will be). The music has to be loud and cheerful, not necessarily pleasing for the ears.

The painting was based on the location sketch of february 22nd last year: tisnieks.

Oil on canvas, 60x70cm.

Pam

Portrait of Pam.
Pam does the same art class as I do, on Saturday morning in Landgraaf, only this time she served as live portrait model.
The excersise was about making you feel every stroke of the brush. We had to work on all parts simultanuously, applying a specific colour whereever it was needed, and then move on to the next colour.
Acrylic on grey carton, 50x60cm, took me about an hour to make.

Diomira

Diomira.

Leaving there and proceeding for three days towards the east, you reach Diomira, a city with sixty silver domes, bronze statues of all the gods, streets paved with lead, a crystal theatre, a golden cock that crows each morning on a tower. All these beauties will already be familiar to the visitor, who has seen them also in other cities. But the special quality of this city for the man who arrives thereon a September evening, when the days are growing shorter and the multicolored lamps are lighted all at once at the doors of the food stalls and from a terrace a woman’s voice cries ooh!, is that he feels envy towards those who now believe they have once before lived an evening identical to this and who think they were happy, that time.

(from Italo Calvino, "the invisible cities").

This drawing was made with ink, scanned in and then totally digitally painted using GIMP (open source Photoshop).

This way of digital painting was a first time for me, and it took a while to know how to handle the program and brushes. Still a long way to go.

Stolberg castle

Not really good one this sketch, view towards the castle of Stolberg, as seen from a parking lot in front of one of the many churches. This is what you get when you are too pressed to finish the drawing, it was getting dark quickly.
I will have to go back and redo this one.
Beautiful view by the way.

Dragon logo

It's a pity that quite often I can't show drawings and stuff of the projects I am working on. That's because I do first versions and feasibility designs, and in those early stages the designs fall within secrecy arrangements.

I just heard that last years project, a chemical plant for Singapore, will be erected somewhere in China.
The project will go under the name "dragon", and the company asked me to design the project logo.

This logo will be used for all drawings, paperwork, and specs. Also on T-shirts and building signs.

Marsha in progress

Working hard on my next stained glass window. It's about Marsha, our cat, sleeping in the sun.

Stolberg

Saturday I made a little tour through our surroundings, visited Stolberg, in Germany just south of Aachen. About 40km from my home, but I had never visited it before. There is a fantastic medieval castle on top of the hill, and steep roads with small typical houses, rising up the slope.
It was still winter there; I looked for a sheltered place to draw and found a little roofed guardpost. But the wind was cold, and my fingers froze; even my fountainpen stopped running. I had practically finished the inkdrawing, but had to do the paintwork at home.

Portrait "toetsen"

Art class; purpose of this exercise was to make a portrait of a (live) model in which the brush strokes must remain visible. The strokes had to be a little transparent to have the colours working in layers. This was the best of the three paintings I made in two hours. Acrylic on carton, about 50x60cm.

Our group (almost all)

A quick sketch of our sketchcrawl group of last saturday. I drew them while we were drinking coffee. Missing in this drawing are my brother (a small revenge: he commented last time that there was no resemblance) and myself.
As I stated last time: resemblance was not really the goal, in these kind of quickies you do well if only one or two really look like the person at hand.

Ikea pots and plants

Ikea has a large department with green stuff, pots and plants. It proved to be a real challenge: it looks like a colourful part, but all these 50 shades of green are difficult to paint. At least to make an interesting painting. I drew and painted most of it on location, but had to adapt a few parts at home.

Ikea seats and pillows

This is the first of my sketches of the sketchcrawl at the Ikea. One of the advantages of drawing there is that you can find a decent table and chairs to sit on while drawing. This was a quick sketch of the seats and pillows department. I left out the people walking by, the walkway was between my table and this scene.

Timeline: January

A new year, a new project.
This year I am planning to make a drawing each month, based on an image in the newspaper or on the internet that hit be somehow. I am planning to do this every 15th of the month (an arbitrary date, it's just the date that this idea came up). I hope that in december these 12 pictures will tell something of the year that has passed. I will choose the images on their graphic quality, and they will be done in black/white with simple coloured area's.
This is a striking image of French soldiers landing in Mali. When looking for it I found as much as 4 different versions of this picture. Original photo by Eric Feferberg.

Sketchcrawl 38, Ikea

I organized another sketchcrawl yesterday, we had so much fun!
We went to the Ikea this time, a good idea considering the cold winter weather.
It's such a nice location to sketch: cosy corners, fresh colours, beautiful objects, and a nice restaurant for the coffee break.
The participants: Kelsey, Rene, Jos, Jacqueline, Pim, Luc, Roger en Tineke.

For the results see our special sketchcrawl blog:
http://sketchcrawllimburg.blogspot.nl/

Burg. Damenpark, Geleen

Winter in the Netherlands.
One of the pleasures of being an architect is passing one of "my" buildings every day, and seeing it is used as I meant it to be.
I designed this bandstand in the Burgemeester Damenpark in Geleen some 15 years ago, and it's still there in good order, and being used regularly. Of course I mean regularly used in summer; in winter it's standing silently in the snow.
I got out of my car wednesday morning to draw some pencil lines, but had to proceed to the office. Too cold to draw anyway.

Sketchcrawl Ikea

Next saturday I organize a sketchcrawl in Heerlen.
At the Ikea, woonboulevard Heerlen.
A sketchcrawl is an international sketching event, held in about 200 places worldwide.
Check this site for our version: http://sketchcrawllimburg.blogspot.nl/ 

If you're interested, we will meet at January 19th, 13.00 hours, at the the IKEA main entrance at the info desk on the right hand side of the main staircase.

Ik organiseer weer een sketchcrawl Limburg op zaterdagmiddag 19 januari. Dit keer bij de Ikea, woonboulevard Heerlen.
Heb je zin, we verzamelen op zaterdag 19 januari om 13.00 uur bij de hoofdingang. Bij de info balie aan de rechterkant van de hoofdtrap.
Deelname is gratis, voor niks, niente, nada, zip.
Meer info zie http://sketchcrawllimburg.blogspot.nl/ 

Misschien tot ziens.