A reason to paint

Every now and then someone asks me why I paint what I paint. Why the skies, the sea, the beaches? Good question but difficult to answer. It's hard for an artist to be perfectly aware of his real motives, so any answer will be an educated guess at best.

I could say that the root of my love for this landscape can be found in the vacations I spent as a kid on the Dutch islands. Every year we'd rent a cottage in the dunes, just a few minutes from the beach. It was the highlight of my year. Freedom to play, to swim, fly a kyte or feel the power of a storm, it was all equally amazing. Even now, almost sixty years later, I feel that same glow when I get on the ferry.


Or I could say that as an art student I found out that landscape painting was my thing. How I discovered the great masters of the past: van Ruysdael, Turner, Constable, Weissenbruch. In their work they showed the sublime, effortless character of nature. I wanted that too.

In my day to day life I don't feel sublime or effortless at all. I guess most people don't. We try hard, but most of the time we're rather clumsy. We stumble through life, get bruised and dented and we make do. Still, every now and then, we have our moments. Most of my moments are related to the islands. Standing on a high dune, overlooking the ocean and see the storm clouds gather at the horizon. Walking on the beach at sunset, with a huge cloud hovering overhead. Watching the white sails between the islands on a hot summer day. And don't forget the sounds that go with these scenes.  Birds, rolling waves, the wind.

 
Maybe that is why I paint what I paint. A reminder of what gets lost so easily in our daily routine.

And of course it keeps the home fire burning...

Reflections (2)

Didn't get a lot of painting done this last week. The exhibition season is starting and I've been busy organizing transport of my work to different galleries. 

Anyway, in my last blog I promised to tell you a bit about painting reflections in moving water. In the nineties I did a series of water colors with no horizon, only water. Very frustrating on the one hand (it just won't sit still) but quite instructive on the other. I wasn't interested in the results, but in obtaining a more or less intuitive feel of the patterns.Funny thing: back then I signed my work in the middle of the picture...





In my oils reflections play a prominent role. For example in this painting of a windy sunset on one of the Dutch islands. I made it a couple of years ago. It's a rather small panel, 50 x 50 cm. The title is 'High Tide'.
 
The bottom layer is painted wet on wet, with an indication of the reflections, painted in subdued colors. If you make em to light, you'll have a hard time applying the lighter details later on. Don't waste your color range, slowly build it up. Find out more, if you want, in my Painting Clouds video.

 The wet on wet layer is done with hog hair brushes and then smoothened with badger hair brushes. You need the smooth surface to contrast with the impasto of the details that will be painted on top if this layer. 

In the picture at the bottom you can see how the actual movement is caused by a pattern of brushstrokes. Doing these details is the fun part of a painting like this. When you look at the surface up close it's an almost abstract painting.The dots are not placed randomly though, they follow the pattern of the waves.

For more details of this painting, please go to my website, click 'portfolio', then 'archive'. It's listed as nr 7, 2009. 

Please, add your comments or questions. I will answer them as soon as possible!

Reflections

Lou from Australia asked me to follow up on my Painting Clouds video with a video on reflections. Maybe in the future, but for now you'll have to make do with this blog post. Sorry Lou...

After the Storm

90 x 120 cm, oil on panel

Sometimes, when the tide is low and there is little wind, a film of water is left on the sand. A perfect mirror for passing clouds. There are a few groundrules. First, reflections are always a tad darker than the stuff they reflect and second, they have less contrast. No sharp edges and hardly any detail. Perhaps that is why painting reflections is a lot easier than painting clouds.

In 'After The Storm' I did the beach first. So, no reflections in the underpainting, just sand, including the details in the lower right corner. When this ground layer was dry I painted the reflections on top of it in a transparent layer, wet on wet.  I applied the paint with a wide brush and blurred the shapes with my badger hair fan brush. I used Talens Transparent White as a starting point for mixing the greyish colors. Because of the transparency of this layer, you sort of 'feel' the sand underneath it.

As you can see the blue of the sky has turned into a much less saturated color, that gets darker close to the bottom edge of the painting. It repeats the smooth transition in the sky from a light to a darker blue, but in a grey tone. But remember: never use black to make your greys, start with a real color and then break it. In my Painting Clouds video you can learn all about how to make a colored grey.


Next time I'll share what I know about reflections in moving water. Hope it doesn't get to technical. Let me know!

The Ruysdael Project (2)

View of the Vlieland Lighthouse, 120 x 160 cm, oil on panel

You may wonder where the lighthouse is. It's the dot on top of the dune in the centre of the painting. I'll help you out.

 

There it is. It's been quite an experience, this attempt to paint a tribute to one of my favorite landscape painters Jacob van Ruysdael.The hardest part was the landscape itself. It had been a while since I painted a panoramic view like this. One of the things I stumbled into was how much detail I should add (in particualr in the foreground), and at the same time not loose track of the big picture. 

I decided to go with the pointillistic approach: painting dots in different shades of green on top of the underpainting. That worked really well to light up certain areas, but I was looking for more refinement. So I paid a visit to my local retailer and I found a fantastic brush: a core of sable hair with squirrel on the outside. Squirrel is often used for water color brushes, because it retains a lot of water. In this brush it serves as a reservoir for the sable. It enabled me to create a network of subtle lines in the foreground, just like I wanted. 

 

 In my previous post I told you I wasn't sure about the water, but in the end I decided to keep it. It connects the sky to the landscape. In one of Ruysdaels Views of Haarlem (he made several) there is water too. Happy coincidence. 

I just finished a 2 minute Youtube video showing the different stages of the painting. I also posted a bigger picture on my website (www.paintingskies.com), with more up close details. In April 2014 it will be part of an exhibition in the Møhlmann Museum (The Netherlands).

Let me know what you're thinking!

The Ruysdael Project

I'm a genuine webshop owner these days. My Painting Clouds video is online since early June 2013 and now my oil sketches are available online too. And with some succes, I must say. Really pleased with it.

I'm still working on the Ruysdael project I told you about earlier. I finally made a choice which of the oil sketches I'd use for the big painting (120 x 160 cm). I decided on the one with the pond and the clouds in backlight. (Check my previous blog for that one. Thanks for the advice, John.) These last few days I've been working on the underpainting. I took a snapshot of me in front of the piece, to give you an idea of the size of the thing. I just had a hair cut. Gave me a cold head, hence the headgear.
 
I decided to paint the blue of the sky without outlining the clouds first. When this layer is dry I'll paint them on top. It's a different approach, compared to the video, where I left them blank in the first stage. The clouds I'm gonna paint on this background are not as massive as in the video and I want the blue of the sky to shine through in some spots. I will have to use my fingers and my cloth to get the edges right. Can't work them into the blue of the sky once the paint is dry. Sorry for the annoying reflections on the right side of the pictures. The paint was still wet when I took em.   

Next I laid down the first layer of the landscape. It's a view at Vlieland, my favorite Dutch island. The lighthouse sits on top of the dune in the distance. That'll probably be one of the last things I'm gonna paint. Got to get the sky right first, before adding a detail like that, no matter how important. 

The first stage of the landscape is done with a wide brush, no details, just to get an idea. I'm not sure if I'm gonna keep the water. Don't know how it'll work out once the sky is finished. In reality the water comes and goes too, depending on the rainfall. 

I'll keep you posted!

Online sale

Thanks for your entries for the free oil sketch contest. You brought a smile to my face with your funny, moving and sometimes sad stories. I had a hard time picking a winner. I narrowed it down to a top ten, then to a top three and I finally decided that Hinke (from Holland) should have the sketch. I will send the runners up (John from Scotland and Grant from the U.S.A.) a little present too.

I've been thinking about selling my work online for quite some time. This silly contest was in fact the last push I needed. I now have a brand new online sales page, where you can purchase my oil sketches. The big paintings will still be sold through the galleries, but if you're looking for a modestly priced oil-on-paper, you may want to take a look.


In the meantime I've been working on the sketches for my Ruysdael project. I'm making good progress and really enjoying it. Kind a liberating, not to plan the whole thing in advance, but just go for it. I think I'll make a few more before I decide which one to use for the real thing. I do have a slight preference though. Which one would you pick? Let me know! 

I use a small water color tablet for my oil sketches. Before I start painting I prime the paper with a few layers of Gesso. To give it just a bit of texture I work the surface with a paint roller.

If you  feel like seeing the whole lot, please visit my online sales page.

Oil sketch for free?

Every now and then I get an invitation to participate in an exhibition with a special theme. I'm not always keen to participate, because of the obligation to create a special piece, often with a certain subject. I cherish the freedom to paint what I feel like.

But the invite I got last week is an exception. The exhibition is titled 'Looking Back in Admiration'. Participants are supposed to make an hommage to an artist they admire. I immediately thought of Jacob van Ruysdael with his 'View of Haarlem'. 

Ruysdael is a 17th century Dutch landscape painter and one of my all time favorites. Learned a lot from the guy, mostly how to create depth by alternating light and shadow. What I like about his Haarlem painting is the high viewpoint, it makes you feel you could step into the frame and wander around the landscape. I tried my hand at this type of painting more than once. The piece on the right is an example, a view of the island Vlieland, seen from the lighthouse.

Working on some ideas at the moment. Made a small oil sketch on paper (18 x 24 cm). It's a view of the island Ameland. The horizon is at the same height as in Ruysdael's painting and the lighthouse is at exactly the same spot as Ruysdael's church. Gonna do some more of these sketches. In the end I want the painting to be real big, 120 x 160 cm maybe. The exhibition opens in April 2014 in the Møhlmann Museum (www.museummohlmann), a privately owned Dutch museum for realist art. 

Now, if you're interested in owning the oil sketch, please send me an e-mail (info@janhendrikdolsma.nl) explaining why you're the one that should have it. The independant jury (with one member: me) will announce the winner in about a month.