I found a new favorite artist - Paul Bril (1554-1626). He was a flemish painter who greatly influenced the landscape art in Italy and northern Europe. He spent most of his time painting in Rome and his Italian landscapes are the most beautiful of all artists, according to me of course but most likely to many others too. 

The yellows and turquoise is what really makes me continue to stare. The turquoise and blue backgrounds are common for medieval and renaissance art. It really puts an emphasis on how the atmosphere is blue. It's not the most realistic as the colors are really vibrant and it looks more like a fantasy world which I love.

This painting looks late autumn to me which it probably is since they are chopping the trees. I wish I had found the names for all of the paintings but I didn't. I should look more into that but I won't because it really doesn't matter that much to me.

I love the red ochre contrast with the pale green background. I couldn't really find a color that fit that red brown color so I had to mix it myself. I know people would have probably just used indian red or venetian red, maybe even burnt sienna, but I don't think they fit enough. It's most likely that the painting is painted with oil paints and I'm talking about watercolors. Still... I like to experiment myself.

Maybe I should put perylene green in my palette, which is a green that looks almost black in thick layers.

This tree... look at that tiny ivy. Ivy is my weakness in paintings.

He painted with oils but I prefer watercolors and gouache and even colored pencils. Oil paints have a strong scent and I found the water based oil paints also smelled too much for my tiny apartment and I have two dogs. I also find them inconvenient and I'm not patient enough to wait for it to dry.

I love the extreme contrast. I had a phase of realism some time back and I think I got caught up in the hyper-realism hype. I tend to like illustrations more than realistic fine art so I don't know what I was thinking there but it did make me learn to create like a 3D effect with contrast which is never bad to learn. I have started to drift back to more semi-realism and I have also started to appreciate abstract art a lot more. This kind of art is my favorite though.

I have the primatek color amazonite from Daniel Smith and although there has been some controversy around the primatek line and other Daniel Smith paints, I love it and use it in my medieval palette. They apparently did use amazonite in their palette back then so that is exciting to me. This paintings greens look a lot like mixing lemon yellow and ultramarine blue and also amazonite. I would use the mars yellow and yellow iron oxide for the yellow but if I wanted it to pop I would put in some nickel azo yellow which is a color I can't live without. It's earthy in thick layers but bright yellow in thinner washes and it makes the most vibrant greens.

 

A lot of watercolorists cringe when somebody uses white or black in their paints but I love it. I'm not afraid to make more gloomy paintings and to stick out, plus I love gouache and adding titanium white makes your paint more opaque, similar to gouache. I usually mix in some color in my blacks though but sometimes I don't. For this painting I would use indanthrone blue which is a deep blue, almost black, but since I'm not afraid to mix medias, I also use waterproof indian ink for the darkest black parts. I find it more convinient to have the darkest parts waterproof and I also use acrylic inks sometimes, which makes even more vibrant colors than watercolor, plus it is waterproof.

I love how much emphasis they put on the blue in the atmosphere during the medeival/renaissance. You see how blue the town in the background is, and sometimes it's even more blue. 

I still have one spot left in my medieval inspired palette and I'm thinking about adding oxide of chromium to it, which looks similar to the green on the right side. It's opaque and have like a dry muddy texture which puts some people off but I like it and it's really beautiful in mixes. I will try to mix it on my own and I suspect you can mix a similar color with lemon yellow, ultramarine blue and titanium white but I have to try it. I did manage to mix my own venetian red with deep scarlet, brown iron oxide and titanium white and I'm going to really think about what color will earn the last spot in my palette.

Stag Hunt (1620). 

I love the colors so much and I made some research, if you can call it that, to make my own medieval palette. Some of the paints isn't available today as some were really toxic so I tried to pick current pigments that fit. I actually ignored some of the standard colors like raw sienna and burnt umber, because I found more similar colors that may have the same pigments but they're a little different. Instead of raw sienna I prefer mars yellow and instead of burnt umber I prefer brown iron oxide. I also use yellow iron oxide which is a bit more golden and granulates more than mars yellow. 

Here's an ink sketch he made. I wonder if he used walnut ink because it was common, but it's fugitive. If it was lightfast I would use it too but I will keep to my acrylic inks instead.

I hope I will get as talented someday! I'm starting to learn to draw architecture and my goal is to be able to draw it from my head. My references lies in my head but I have to use real references in order to learn to draw the pictures in my head. It is like you collect information in a picture archive in your head and if you collect enough you are able to pull anything from that archive and create whatever you want without any photos. 

Well that's that. Have a great day!

 I have lost this sketch somewhere and I'm sad because I love it. It's a study of a fountain that I can't remember where it's built or by who.

The male figure is really beautiful with its intricate muscles and proportions.

I couldn't get his profile right so I turned it slightly and I'm glad I did since I got to reenforce the tension with his expression. I was surprised though. I recognised his face and I searched on pinterest with keywords I thought would fit my memory and low and behold, I found it. My face is in my preference but I think they are similar.

 

Long time no see!

I should post more often but I forget I even have a blog. I rarely write about my art or its process but I really should do that, even though nobody reads my blog, haha!

I want to share I was part of an exhibition and I sold 4 paintings and later another painting through my boyfriend, who was so kind to show my art at his work. 

I have been part of another exhibition before but I chose to paint what somebody said they thought I should paint and I was desperate to earn some money, so I didn't paint what I wanted AND it showed in the quality of my paintings too. I take full responsibility for that. I will never paint something for the sake of what other people might want ever again. It obviously didn't work anyway.

Here is some photos from right before the opening.

I sold the abstract sun called "Sunflare", "The Girl" up to the right and the mother with her newborn called "Motherhood". I chose to not put up the man with the book "Nobel History" for sale at the last minute. I love it too much. Some people was interested in the upper left painting "The Hermit's Cave" but it was the most expensive.

Two people was interested in the lower painting "Trespassing" but they didn't act on it since I put a higher price on it. The paintings I sold was in the lower price range and honestly I was surprised anyone actually bought something based on Sweden's bad economy right now. The upper painting is called "Forest of Elderflowers" and I thought it would be more popular because it looks so realistic. I got a lot of praise for how detailed the deer's fur is but some of my other paintings made people stay and watch them for a longer time.

The one above is called "Evening's Empress" and the lower is called "A Jester's Patience". My boyfriend was nervous the lower was going to be sold because he loves it so much but it didn't. He bought it later haha but I'm giving it to him as a Christmas gift.

The one above is called "Guilt" and was in the higher price range too but I actually sold it. Somebody I know bought it and that makes me happy since I love the painting so much. The one beneath is called "Mare" as in the folklore of the creature sitting on you during nightmares. I actually wanted to call it "Psychotic Trip" because that was kind of what I was feeling when I painted it but it felt like a too dark and personal name to show to strangers.

Here is some of the paintings before I hung them up. I haven't seen several of my paintings framed together like this ever and I'm surprised how much better they look framed actually.

Unfortunately I didn't take a good photo of the last painting I sold. I forgot, since I hung it in a corner. It was a colorful tree with a witch hat on a branch and I was going to put a seriously low price on it but the others at the exhibition told me to put a higher price on it. Not only because they thought it was too good, they also said it can look, how do I say it, cheap and trashy is probably the best description, if I put a too low price on it. I agreed and I'm glad I did since I sold it.

This was a really great experience for me and I'm happy I chose to take part in this, especially since I felt like such a failure after the last exhibition. I'm going to take part of more exhibitions and join this organisation after New Year's. It will be a good way to go outside more and I really liked the people I met there. They get together and paint and try new painting techniques and have exhibitions and I'm looking forward to it!

I hope whoever who reads this will have a great evening!

Take care and don't forget the power of imagination and creativity. It is food for the soul.

Trespassing

    This painting took me weeks to finish, because I had to take so long breaks between the layers since I often felt lost and sometimes even wondered if I ruined it. Although, I thought of how I once heard someone say that there is an "ugly" layer with watercolors, that makes you unsure and feel lost. I call this the second layer *snort*. But I continued my work and tried to make the best I could instead of scrapping the painting. 

    This painting - Trespassing - is about a man forced to trespass on the giant lonebear's home that has claimed a mountain as its own. The man needs to find food for his family, since the colonists have started to cut down the forest that is his people's hunting ground. 

    My inspiration for the clothing is of native american and east-asian, but as you can tell, this is a fantasy world. The tree is called Sanguiz-tree and has bloodcoloured sap and is a key to the islands ecosystem. The bear is drawn without reference (like everything else) so there is some errors in the anatomy, as I've only done three studies of bears so far. I imagine it's a fantasy breed since it's so large and black.

    I used an inexpensive paper Canson Montval Torchin. Cheap but decent paper is a must for me to have when I feel pressure to perform. The paper has an interesting texture that is described as snow. I used graphite for the sketch, inked it with pigma microns and painted a layer of W&N waterproof indian ink to add shadows. I used my maaany watercolours (mostly DA) but also white and black gansai paint. At last I used colored pencils (Polychromos, Museum Aquarelle, Derwent Drawing, Luminance) for the details, which is a must for me since I have shaky hands. 

    I must add that I adore the sky. It was made with some of Schmincke's limited edition Supergranulating Tundra with a thin layer and afterwards Daniel Smith's Neutral Tint with a lot of water and I pressed it with tissuepapers while it was still wet. 

Morten E. Solberg

    Morten E. Solberg is a fineart artist who was born is Cleveland, Ohio and got an education in Cleveland Institute Of Art. He is famous internationally for his paintings that range from realism to total abstraction. He paints with watercolour, acrylics and oils. 

    Personally, I'm in love with his watercolour paintings of realistic animals with abstract backgrounds. Since he is alive I won't share his work directly on my page, but I will share a link directly to his website, just for your convenience. 

    I also recommend searching google on the large settings to really get a close up view of all of the beautiful details. I do not however support to save them since there is a copyright issue.

Here is the link to his website: http://www.mortenesolberg.com/ 

STAINING WATERCOLOUR Paints

Staining colours isn't my favorites to work with... at all. Still, I have almost every hue of phthalo I can find. I like to mix them in natural, muted colours when I want to see some vibrant spark amidst it all.

Arthur's Journal (RDR2)

     I'm obsessed with Red Dead Redemption 2. I used to visit a place about 80km up north-west from where I live in Sweden. In a place calleed Surnadal, in Norway. I used to fish in a river, although I found that a little boring I loved the view. However, I loved fishing out on the fjords. I loved playing on the shores, with gray mud and brown and green seaweed... white chalk beaches with stones that hurt my feet, but that didn't matter. I was in a valley of fields and forests, or on a mountain of waterfalls and moss. This is why I love this game - Red Dead Redemption 2. It gives some comfort, meaning it reminds me of my childhood's (and adulthood's) favorite place. 

    Surnadal is one of the main sources of my inspiration for art. The game RDR2 helps me relive that. The main character also draws in a journal. This is why I share this information - art. 

    This is some of the main character's art in his journal. I love it, but if I sketched this loose I would be hesitant to share it. That is wrong of me. Loose sketching is wonderful. This is why I share this.

All credits goes to R* of course, but also to this reddit poster.

https://www.reddit.com/r/reddeadredemption/comments/buxjuv/completed_arthurs_journal_pdf_and_zip/