Chapter 7: Drawing the landscape

3.7.1 Find a pencil drawing by Van Gogh

Reproductions of Van Gogh’s work have been (for me) a sort of visual background noise, as they are everywhere, if I want to look at them or not. My reaction has always been to blend them out, so I never really got acquainted with his work. Taking a closer look now was, as always, rewarding.

 

My choice for this activity. I like the rhythm of the lines in the wheat field and the spirals in the trees. The precision of the farm house and the other buildings seem a kind of anchor. Also the drawing appeared to be “doable” = not too difficult.

 

I used pencils no 8, 6 and 3 on strong drawing paper (about 230 g).

 

I tried to find a rhythm drawing the wheat field rather than reproduce the lines exactly. The shades of the lines are distributed unevenly, which makes Van Gogh’s drawing lively. I tried to capture this. Central lines helped to place the elements, you can still see the traces.

 

3.7.2 Drawing a landscape of my own

 

 

My original photograph and the part I chose for my drawing. Sunflowers for a chapter dealing with Van Gogh! I thought their distinct shapes and dark centers would make a lovely foreground. The drawing was done on 220g drawing paper, again with pencils 8, 6 and 3. Concentrating on the quality of lines helped me to structure the drawing process and not to get impatient.  It also gave me a criterion to see if parts of the drawing needed more or less work.

 

 

3.7.3 Painting my own landscape

 

 

My photograph: tea time at Kynance Cove in Cornwall looking towards Lizard Point. I like the combination of still life and landscape. The tea things provide a strong focal point in the foreground with several elliptic shapes, from there the path takes the eye to the beach and between the rocks out to the sea.

The paper used is A3, 240 g, prepared for oil and acrylics. The drawing was done with coloured pencil, again with central lines.

 

	I started with acrylics to do the underpainting, see left - and had to keep myself back from painting  to many details at this point. However, I changed to pastels for the final layer. I hope this is ok. Apart from the fact that I love working with pastels: As the days grow shorter I can paint only in the evening. It has become difficult for me to see wet colours in artificial light. I do not have this problem with pastels.
	A daylight studio lamp is now on my wish list for Christmas. To the left is the finished landscape, below a two-part scan for detail. If I had to paint it again I would place the sugar glass a little higher to connect the tea things better to the middle and back ground. Now this is only done with the blue and white reflections.

Chapter 6: Torn Paper Lines

3.6.1  Tearing papers in different ways

	Newspaper torn with the grain
	Newspaper torn against the grain
	Office paper torn with and against the grain.
	Light watercolour paper (160 g/ square meter) torn against the grain, with nice broad edges.
	Same paper torn with the grain.
	A sheet of recycled wrapping paper, there is hardly any grain at all, as the fibers are short. It is very easy to tear in all kinds of shapes.
	Shapes torn from different papers pasted on two opposing pages in my sketchbook. The right page was covered with gesso first.
	Ink wash (Winsor and Newton Sunshine Yellow) on the right  page.  I like the way the white paper shapes show up as the torn edges soak up the colour.
	I covered another page  with gesso, pasted torn watercolour paper and the lining of an envelope on this layer. Then I painted stripes of gesso over the page and finaly an ink wash of red wine ink (a local product, smells nicely of wine). It was a quick tryout to see if this would work, and  the composition is not exciting. Something to be explored further on.

 

3.6.2

Viewfinders

 

 

I have used the two L-shaped pieces on the left for some time, also in this activity. The square (8,5x8,5 cm) and the rectangle (8,5x12 cm) were made according to the instructions in the module. I am looking forward to going out and using them.

 

Collage landscapes

 

	I first traced the whole photograph to see how the stripes looked like and made enlarged copies of the area I had chosen with the help of the viewfinder.
	Same procedure here. I chose the lower left corner of the tracing. I had fallen in love with the papers (gift paper and self-coloured paper), so it is more about them than about the design. The white edges are well for the foam though.
	Here I worked from a small photograph and enlarged the tracing, which left me with fewer lines than before. I tried to match not the colours, but the tones as closely as possible. Still, the colours are surprisingly alike.

In the foreground the white lines of the  torn edges did not fit in, so I cheated and painted them over carefully with bistre ink.

 

Tryptichon

 

My source and a copy of the traced page – much worked on, as you can see.

I thought for a long time about my choice of papers. In the previous example I had worked with muted, soft colours, which worked well for the photograph taken on a rainy day, but now I wanted to try something different. I chose strongly coloured papers – reproductions of paintings from a calendar, done in deep, intense acrylics, and gold-coloured gift paper. The foreground was cut from an old envelope in ochre, papers coloured with acrylics and cling film, and I made pastels for the sky and the mountains.  So I ended up with strong contrasts: papers with patterns against blank papers, smooth surfaces against shiny ones, dark areas against light ones. I had been worried about neglecting the tones, but I like the result. Looking at the three pieces I remember that sunny day.

 

 

A few weeks ago I picked up a brochure with a painting  that seems to fit in with the work in this chapter (and the next). It was done by the German expressionist painter Karl Schmidt-Rottluff.

I like the way he suggests trees and landscape features by creating patterns within the stripes.

 

Chapter 5: Spaces make Lines

3.5.1

Lines made by cutting and pasting black squares

 

	I wanted to see how regular and irregular placing of the cut squares influences the way I see the line. I think that irregular placing makes for more interaction of the line and the shapes around the squares.

 

Circles

 

When does space change into a line? Somewhere along the way ... In contrast to the shape on page 04 right I tried a very thin line on page 05.

 

Irregular shapes

 

The idea of “quiet” and “unquiet” lines in combination with irregular forms and placing came up on page 06. On page 07 I placed the cut shapes more freely to get a few lines branching away from the main line. It was like doing a puzzle, and a lot of fun.

As I cut and pasted I was more and more reminded of natural forms, lines on stones found on a beach, traces of insects on leaves and bark and much more.

 

3.5.2 Working with coloured papers

First I made some coloured papers, as I had almost used up my stock. It was lovely to do this again.

	Strips from an old calendar image on acrylics ground. The idea for the striped pattern came from the painting. This has a strong pattern in itself, so the negative shapes do not emerge very strongly.
Wrapping paper on acrylics ground. The pattern was inspired by Pentrego,	a 16th century farmhouse in Wales where I stayed during my holiday.
	Papers coloured with gouache. I think the clear lines and the washes of colour enhance each other.
	Leftovers from above, a nice bookmark
	Leftover shapes from Module 1 on wrapping paper from a flower shop. (It would be nice to cover the intensely pink paper with shapes in a muted colour to make the lines stand out – the idea has just popped up during writing.)

These are also leftover snippets from Module 1, cut and arranged to form patterns of lines. At first I thought a stronger contrast of colours would be better, but looking at the images a few days later I like them.  

 

Extra activity:

I love Andy Goldsworthy’s work! At the moment his books are out of print in Germany. I am glad I have a few.

 

During my walking holiday in Wales I gathered strands of wool, spun them in the evening and draped the thread somewhere near my tent. This is a rather delicate line on Llan Cryngoed campsite.

When I came back home the time for  cherries was already over. On the table under the cherry tree a lot of fallen cherries had dried and moulded. I placed them in line and took the photograph a moment before the rain began, in the last light of the sun. I like the shadow and the stems of the cherries sticking out. Next time I would form the line to be at an angle to the gaps between the boards of the table and the fissures.

 

When I came home from work yesterday a strong rain had beaten a lot of flowers from a bush. They were quite fresh and crisp and could be arranged in different ways – joined to make a chain, stuck upright into the grass, piled randomly. The sun played hide-and-seek behind rain clouds the whole time, and I tried to catch the changing light and moved around my lines a lot when taking the photographs.

 

		Lines of flowers DIASHOW ANZEIGEN ALLE HERUNTERLADEN