Sloe on Vellum

It has been a long time since I last painted on vellum. Two weeks ago I found my vellum again and thought it would be fun to paint something  on the calfskin. I rescued last Monday a branch of the Blackthorn in front of our house. Just before the big storm arrived. I love Sloe, the twigs with the thorns, the white flowers in spring and of course the berries in autumn.

It always takes a while to get used to painting on vellum again. It's so different from painting on paper because the paint sits on the surface and doesn't get absorbed. The result is more brilliant and warm. It's more alive. Maybe more on vellum soon...

Botanical Challenge

Every year in September our Botanical Artists Group on Facebook has a 30 days challenge. Normally I can't keep up with it and never end up with 30 paintings/drawings at the end of it. Dianne Sutherland organised this year's challenge. I'll try it too... again...

Because there were a lot of things going on here at my house this week, I already fell a bit behind. So for my first entry I painted not one but two things. A hip of Rosa moyesii 'Geranium' and Acorns from Bertus' harvest. Hopefully I can do two more tomorrow.

Whitecurrants

This weekend I painted a little string of pearls.

 

 

Bulbs Instead

Look what my parents gave me last weekend. Isn't it just gorgeous? But this post is not about Peonies...

It should have been about the progress I've made with my Clematis. Unfortunately my shoulder, neck and elbow are hurting too much to work with my coloured pencils right now. Especially working on the easel makes it even worse. That's a bit ironic because I started that big drawing on my easel to sit straight up and therefore it would be better for my neck.But that Clematis will be there later. I took many sketches and studies of it so (with all the reference photos I took) I will be able to continue that drawing in a month.

So to prevent myself from falling into a large gap of boredom I went to Eenrum last weekend to visit "De Kleine Plantage" again. Summer/Autumn bulbs from Hein Meeuwissen and Rita van der Zalm were there. So I had a drooling time at their stand. I had a few Dahlias planned for my garden but what I really wanted to buy were some wonderful looking bulbs. Flowers were less important. I also bought another Arisaema griffithii rhizome. Hopefully I will get some results from it this year.

The bulbs I bought are really nice and I started to draw the most beautiful one almost immediately. The problem was that I couldn't finish it the day after because we had a birthday party here. So the bulb was already two days in the house when I actually could start painting it. Unlike all the other bulbs I bought, this one started to grow as soon it felt the warm temperatures inside my house. Next time I'll try not to forget to put my bulbs in the fridge until I can actually draw it. But let me show you... always better than words, no?

This is the bulb I'm talking about. Isn't it a beauty? Sprekelia formosissima this is. I was so in love with the silver and dark brown skin in combination with the lovely pink sprouts. I took this photo on the same day that I bought it.
Now here is the bulb I painted only two days later:

You see how fast it's growing? And even when I sat painting it, the flower-buds kept moving and growing... So I have to paint fast. Fortunately I'm almost finished with the buds now and I can soon start to paint the rest of the bulb but I'd better hurry with that too before the flowers will open. Yikes!!!

The rest of the bulbs I bought? Here they are:

Hippeastrum Sonatini 'Helios'. A hardy Amaryllis with very light green-yellow small flowers. I didn't like the bulb so much but the flowers looked amazing. Couldn't resist :P

This is Lilium 'Pink Perfection'. I'm not crazy about Lilies but this one I bought because the colours in the bulb are so pretty.

And finally some of the most beautiful bulbs I know: Narcissus 'Paperwhite'. Again, I'm not a fan of Narcissus flowers but the bulbs I adore. Look at the rich dark brown and shiny skin! Mouthwatering beauties....

So I'll be busy painting to rest my shoulder and elbow. I don't mind... I love bulbs!!!

A Bulb Drawing and Some News

A lot has happened lately. Really... a lot. I'm happy to say it's all quite positive. I finished a bulb drawing today, an interview about me and my art was published in Noorderland magazine, I finally built my new website (and it works!!!!) and I'll be teaching in a new course about drawing botanical art with coloured pencils. It's a lot.

First of all, let me show you the drawing. It's done in coloured pencil and it's a Crocosmia 'Lucifer' bulb which I pulled out of my garden this week. The contrast of the died leaves and the new, toxic green sprout is so nice. Well, I like it anyway :P

It wasn't an easy thing to draw in coloured pencil. I think it would have been more easy if I had used only graphite pencils. The hardest part of it was the fibre, straw-like part above the bulb and between the two dead leaves. White thin sprigs. Many of them too... Ah well, I managed it somehow and I'm rather pleased with the result too. That doesn't happen so often.

So... then there's the article, 6 full pages in a very nice magazine, Noorderland. A large interview, a lot of my drawings (nicely printed) and nice photos of stuff in my studio and also of me. So if you live in the Netherlands or there about, have a look.

Now, because I was going to feature in this big article I really had to update my website. And because I'm such a stubborn person that always knows best and never likes prefab website designs, I wanted to build it myself. I'm happy now with the style and all I need now is to build a little e-store to sell cards, prints and other stuff. So if you haven't done it already, please have a look at it. Some feedback is always nice ;)

www.sigridfrensen.com

Finally the 6-day-drawing-course. That will be (I really hope I get enough students for this) next June in the botanical garden "De Kruidhof" in Buitenpost. On my website is a folder with more info. It will be six days in three weeks time. I'm looking forward to it... sitting in the gardens there, peacefully struggling with all the plant material, trying hard to get it all down on paper.... Aaaaah..... splendid!

Vegetables

As you may know, I don't have a very big love for painting flowers. I prefer the twigs, pods, buds and seeds... sometimes even some leaves.... Some of my friends on Facebook are doing the SBA's Distance Learning Diploma Course in botanical art. One of the assignments is to paint vegetables. They also do fruits and flowers of course but this veggies assignment is really interesting, I think. Inspired and intrigued by this challenge I am now spotting wonderful vegetables everywhere. I'm getting so excited about it all that I'm now almost ready to turn part in my garden into a *beautiful vegetables* spot. Not even so much for eating it (although that is of course a nice bonus) but more for painting and drawing the stuff. Here are some things that are really interesting. And there's so much more..... (oh, and because I would also plant some tomatoes and other *fruit* in my little plot, I'll add those too here)

 

Top to bottom: 'Cabbage' by Yannha, 'Kale' by Yannha, Cabbage 'Alaska' at Marshalls, Aubergine 'Prosperosa' at Thompson & Morgan,  'Toma-tres' by Cebolledo, Pak Choi by Munduate, 'Fennel' by Paul Petherick, 'Candy Stripe Beet' or 'Chioggia' at Plant World Seeds, Lettuce 'Yugoslavian Red' at Thompson & Morgan, Cosmic Purple Carrots at Plant World Seeds, 'Onions' by sfPhotocraft, 'Local Colour - Les Nourritures Terrestres' by Pusapoze, Shallot 'Picasso' at Thompson & Morgan, Swede 'Tweed' at Thompson & Morgan

I know... it's much more than just greens.

Plant and seed shopping

I went to Eenrum again today, to my nursery "De Kleine Plantage". Mainly because they sell my cards and lot of them were sold out. I never leave empty handed when I go there. They have so much pretty plants and things. But no big buys today, even though it was their Roses and Clematis weekend. I want a peach coloured rose in my front garden but didn't find one that was good enough. Most of the ones that had nice flowers grew on shrubs that were too low for the place where I want it. Other roses with great flowers (gorgeous even) were ramblers. Also not what I need right now. I guess I'll have to look elsewhere or just alter my plans, go for something red instead or something.
Anyway.... I did buy some plants and some seeds. Here's what I bought:

- Agastache "Black Adder":

photo: Guy Hendrieckx 

- Foeniculum vulgare "Giant Bronze" (had it for years and love it):

Anemone 'Rosenschale':

photo: De Kleine Plantage

Lythrum salicaria 'Blush':

photo: Adam Woodruff

And these seeds:


- Eschscholzia californica 'Milky White':

photo: Annie's Annuals

Tropaeolum majus 'Salmon Gleam':

photo: Deeproot Plant Base

Tropaeolum 'Black Velvet':

photo: Busy Bee

 Lathyrus tingitanus:

photo: Florus

Cosmos Rubenza:

photo: Sericea

Papaver rhoeas 'Parelmoer':

 

Scabiosa atropurpurea 'Black Knight':

photo: Photofarmer

Sowing tomorrow with Bertus :))
 

Spring is coming!

The very first sign of spring for me is when the Hazel (Corylus avellana) in my back garden starts to flower. The large yellow-green catkins dangling in the wind always make me smile. So fun that the male (the large greenish worms) and female (tiny red fluffy bits) catkins flower on the same twig.

I wanted to paint a larger twig than this but got a bit bored by the catkins. To be honest, I started to paint it very detailed but soon got lazy. And since I was doing it for fun I made a bit impressionistic catkins. At the end I put in some sharper details and shadows. I think I got away with it :P

Hips

I finally managed to finish something again. And it was about time too. For the first time I painted rose hips with my watercolours. I already did hips in graphite, coloured pencils and even with pen & ink. But never watercolour. The Botanical Artists forum on Facebook has a bunch of very active and motivating members and when one starts to paint apples, we all start to paint apples. When one mentions she wants to paint hips I too want to paint hips.... It's fun though, to see all the different approaches to the same subject.

For the first time. And it was nice work. I really enjoyed doing it. I chose the tiny hips of Rosa 'Francis E. Lester'. This rose blooms with many clouds of small flowers during the summer and gets an enormous amount of orange hips in Autumn.

This is on Lanaquarelle HP, paper size 4"x 6".

New stuff for my garden

In Eenrum I bought some plants. Thought I'd better write it down somewhere to remember myself what it is I bought. I always forget....

- Angelica Gigas (2x)

- Astrantia major "Blues Night"

- Pulmonaria "Blue Ensign"

- Phlox "Rosa Pastell"

- Agastache "Blue Fortune" (although I wanted "Black Adder")

- Digitalis Mertonensis

- Astrantia major ex. "Hadspen Blood"

- Geranium "Sandrine"







I also bought some seeds to throw around in the garden Atriplex hortensis "Red Plume" is probably the best of all. Okay.... let's play in the soil now :))

Sweet Violet

This tiny violet is flowering in my garden now. It's native to Europe and Asia but also introduced in America. It has a wonderful sweet scent and is therefore used in perfumes. It has a beautiful deep violet purple colour (which is always fun to paint). Painted on Fabriano smooth watercolour paper. 9 x 8 cm

That look...

I was drawing the last two days. I saw a photo last week on Flickr. One of my contacts uploaded a photo of a girl. It was taken in the 1930s or so. The only thing we know about this girl is her name, Ruth Akin. Her portrait was so impressive, it was on my mind all week and I just had to draw that face. There's something about that girl. Her pose, her mouth... but most of all her eyes. They tell a story and it could be a very big secret or a sad history... maybe she was just tired. I guess we'll never know. It was a challenge to draw her and I made three drawings of her. The final one was the best and I think I captured a bit of her mysterious look. I made her with black coloured pencil to get a very dramatic contrast, like the photo.
I must say that it was a lot of fun to do and maybe I'll do something like this again some day.

The other thing I did (today) is going to my nursery to sell some of my cards and to buy some plants for my garden. I bought Astrantia, Pulmonaria, Angelica Gigas and a few other beauties. After collecting all the plants I wanted, I went for a walk in the spring garden of the nursery. Many wonderful flowers already. Helleborus, Corydalis, Scilla and, the best of all, Fritillaria. Not the normal Frits but a very light, creamy yellow, 50 cm high beauty: Fritillaria raddeana. They were planted all over the garden and it looked so wonderful. The weather was cold and very wet but those flowers lightened up the entire garden.

Another sweet surprise was a flower I never saw before. Well, not in this colour anyway. It had a name tag beside it and it said: Dentaria heptaphyllos. I couldn't find a lot of Dentaria heptaphyllos on Google though. But I did find out that it's better known as Cardamine enneaphyllos (Drooping Bittercress for normal people).

It's on my wishlist, just like that Fritillaria (funny that they both have the same pretty yellow I can tolerate in my garden... well... it's not very yellow at all.... Ivory.... Cream.... Lovely). Aaaahhhh.... spring :))