Tuesday's life Drawing

Venue: Konstnärshuset, Stockholm, 20150217

We had a new model, she is from Catalonia and is a circus artist. It's always enjoyable with a new model, it takes time to get to know how to draw his or her form.

Ten minute nude

Ten minute nude

Five minute nude

Five minute nude

Two minute nude

Two minute nude

Five minute nude

Thank you for the flowers ...

Thank you for the flowers Berit and Pierre.

Lillies, Fabriano GF 300g, 30x40cm 

Island fishing

Not much to say about this painting, it's partly from a photograph and partly from my imagination. I am producing a lot of work right now, the quality may not be 100% but I feel it's important to just paint and paint a lot, I'm learning at a very fast rate because of this. The original size was a lot larger but I cropped it as it lacked compositional impact. It is now 17 x 12cm in size on Fabriano GF 300g paper.

Island fishing. Fabriano GF 300g paper. 17 x 12cm  

Party tulips

I had a party at the weekend for my friends from Life Drawing and Urban Sketchers. It was a great evening and everybody seemed to enjoy themselves immensely. We were given lots of flowers which was ideal for painting afterwards.

Tulips. Arches rough 300g, 28.5 x 38.5cm 20120212

Dealing with bad drying conditions

Here in Sweden it's cool and damp between September and December. And it's pretty cool the rest of the year except for July and August which means it is hard to dry watercolours while outdoors. I visited the hardware store for a solution and I think I found it. I'll just have to be careful not to set the paper on fire! :)

Mini Burner

Tuesday's model

Venue: Konstnärshuset, Stockholm. 20150203

We had a wonderful model this week which was a real treat. She held a very elegant pose, time after time. The session was quite inspiring.

Five minute nude on A4 Fabriano sketch paper

Five minute nude on A4 Fabriano sketch paper

Five minute nude on A4 Fabriano sketch paper

Five minute nude on A4 Fabriano sketch paper

Five minute nude

Ten minute nude

Horses are tricky

I've been painting horses recently, they are difficult to paint and draw but I like the challenge. This small painting used to be much larger but I chopped off the legs due to my inability to capture their movement. Meanwhile I'm working on two other horse paintings and as usual, the more one practices, the easier it gets.

Galloping horse. 11.5 x 7.8 cm Arches rough 300g

Tuesday's Life Drawing

Life Drawing at Konstnärshuset, Stockholm, 20150127

I have not much to say about these illustrations. A picture speaks for itself anyway, so I'll just sign off now and get back to my drawing-board.

Ten minute nude

Five minute nude

Ten minute study

Five minute nude.

Playing around

This female nude was incomplete until I got my fingers dirty with charcoal dust and finished the contours of her body.

A4 nude, Fabriano sketch paper

Urban Sketching in zero degrees.

We were a group of seven or eight Urban Sketchers on top of Katarina Elevator last Sunday. It was zero degrees, my water did not freeze but it didn't dry very well either. After half an hour it got too cool for us and we retreated to a nearby café where we could warm up again. It was only then that my watercolour sketch dried.

Katarina Elevator view, Slussen, Stockholm. A4 watercolour Moleskin, 200g paper.

Tuesday's Life Drawing

Venue: Konstnärshuset, Stockholm, 20150120

Ups and downs, that's the way my abilities go when capturing a model's pose.

I've had this model several times before, I've always struggled to catch her beauty and elegant ballerina posturing. It's strange because she is quite pretty. I guess it's like dating, sometimes there's magic and on other occasions there is nothing at all. Does that make sense?

Five minute nude

Five minute nude

Five minute nude

Two minute nude

Two - three minute nude

Lunchtime watercolour

White horse. 11.5 x 7.8 cm Fabriano GF 300g

I must admit, I need a break from sailing boats, I love sailing and the Stockholm archipelago but I have to resist it for a while. I decided to paint a horse yesterday instead, I build horse-sport websites during the day so it feels kinda natural to paint them too. It is a small painting, 11.5 x 7.8 cm. Keeping it little means less surface to paint and so practical for lunch break watercolour painting. I see improvement in my technique, painting and drawing as much as I can really pays, which feel really nice.
This week I have painted every morning for an hour before going to work, I paint at lunchtime, I have Life Drawing twice and figure painting once during the seven days.

Lunchtime watercolour

I started this lunchtime watercolour last week, I didn't finish it during my break so I spent one more hour on the painting yesterday morning. I am testing to see if I can cope with getting up one hour earlier at the moment. I started yesterday so it's early days. I'm too tired in the evenings after a full-day's work to feel inspired to paint, getting up earlier feels better, it's tough but better, if you know what I mean. It's not easy being an artist but it's very rewarding!

Storm clouds. A5 Fabriano GF 300g

First life drawings of 2015

Venue: Konstnärshuset, Stockholm, 20150113.

It was nice to start life drawing again. I felt a bit rusty. The model, who is very good, made endless difficult poses for us. After a while I started to relax and enjoy myself. I used charcoal dust, my hero calligraphy pen and my trusty 0.7 Pentel mechanical pencil with 2b lead.

10 minute nude.

3 minute nude.

10 minute nude.

2 minute nude.

5 minute nude.

2 minute nude.

5 minute nude.

Lunchtime watercolour

This watercolour of a Stockholm tram took me two lunchtimes. I struggled with the background, I should have done a tonal sketch first, unfortunately I do not have time to be that professional. I prefer quantity to quality at the moment anyway, it's more important for me to just paint as often as I possibly can and learn. The masterpieces will come later, I hope.

Tram Nr.7 to Skansen, Stockholm. 20150113. Fabriano FG 300g 17 x 22 cm