Conker

So... not reaching the target of 30 this year. Last year it was my arm and now the cold spoiled it. Oh well, I'll just continue with a few, just for fun. Here's a conker in coloured pencil. There might be more of them since there are still many on the trees. And they are loads of fun to draw.

Souvenir from Florence

Now that all paintings are finished for the SBA show in London (I framed them yesterday), I wanted to draw something small. And with pencil! After all this time working with the small brushes and watercolours I just had to do a pencil drawing. On my desk I found a small Cypress cone. I found it in Italy last year near the Villa del Trebbio in Tuscany. There were lots of Cypresses on that hill, many of them very old.

 

In a few hours I made this small drawing in my sketchbook. I love drawing pine cones and this one was nice too. I think it's because I can go really black in the shadows. I also love the shape of these cones. Anyway, here it is:

Cypress Cone, Graphite pencil 3,5 x 6 cm

Playing with greens

Yesterday I was mixing greens. Just experimenting with my browns, yellows, blues and greens. I got some really nice colours but didn't do much with it. Rather stupid not to make something nice with it, I thought. So I started this little memory of a walk through the forest I took last year.

I used a reference photo too but didn't look too much at it. I think the greens I used are a bit more springtime than they actually were when I took that walk (October).
I never work this "free", it's a bit uncomfortable for me but sometimes it's nice to let yourself go and do something entirely different.

Fungi family

A few weeks ago I was in the beautiful forest of Roden. There were thousands of mushrooms, so many different kinds and all so pretty. I made some photos so I could maybe draw them at home. Bertus was with me so I couldn't sketch there. I picked this one for a drawing. It's not very detailed. I just don't have enough time and energy to do that. I made it on (bad) paper with coloured pencils and soft pastels.