the grassy bits between

My rabbit Pollock insisted to play the Easter Hare this year!
I wish you all a nice, sunny Easter weekend!

only in my head

These are two of my new drawings. As I started them I was absolutely convinced by the new directions the drawings were going. As I finished this one, I already wasn't so sure about my new idea, but I told myself that at least I have to finish the second one. So I did and there should be a number 3, but I don't know if I will ever draw that one. I'm already started a new drawing in another direction. This is not what I imagined them to be. Maybe the drawings will work if you see them all 3 hanging next to each other, like a triptych. Sometimes the images in my head turn out to be a bit different in reality...

like a sweet memory

This is a drawing of me as a little kid and my mum. We were on a holiday in our own country, The Netherlands. The weather was beautiful, very warm and my mum is laying in the sand at the dunes, enjoying the sun and I'm crawling all over her, playing. This weekend should have been her birthday. I miss her very much but I'll have a drink to celebrate her birthday!

let's take life nice and easy

The weather is so wonderful for the last two weeks, that today I try to enjoy it and not let anything upset me, even if I had a bad day at my job.

a touchy situation

Every time I finish a drawing there's the challenge of taking a picture of it. It's quite difficult because they are so big, I have to be careful with the paper (you  can't see it on this picture but I have to stand on  a chair or ladder). And I have to wait for the correct light, because you see every shadow on the white paper. After that I still have to clean them up in photoshop...most of the time it takes an hour to make them look okay. You can see a glimpse of a new drawing by the way, wish you all a nice weekend!

sweeties and cuties

Today is the official start of springtime! And we have such beautiful, sunny weather that this start couln't be better. I wish you all a nice day, hopefully also with some sun and some first flowers that start to show up as well.

welcome in 2012

Yesterday I bought a new mobile phone. "So what", you might think, but for me it was a big deal. I never in my live bought a phone. In 2003 I moved to Switzerland for 3 years and my mother didn't like the idea that she couldn't reach me in the train during travelling. So she bought me a phone. I used that old phone until yesterday. People would start to laugh if they saw it, but I call it vintage, haha! And as I told you before, my mother passed away, so this phone became important for me, because it was a thing that showed that my mother cared about me (off course she did!). But now it started to fall apart, I didn't get phonecalls or messages so it became annoying. Well....I had to get a new one. And if I had to, I thought by myself, I might go from vintage to smartphone. So now I'm sitting here trying to figure it out and my Teddy is taking care of my old phone.  Good I still have my Teddy.... I might as well keep the old phone;-)

one word or idea

As a comment to my last post, Mano wrote that she would love to see some of my sketches... I work in phases and these sketches are the last step before I start the actual drawing. I also write all kind of possible titles or words on them that I associate with the drawing. I keep a book where I collect sentences, maybe I show you some pages of that too someday. These drawings are made on the computer ( with red colour pencil try-outs on them) and not very spectacular...

it has to give in

I finished a new drawing. This one is a bit different then the rest of the drawings, maybe this is the first one where the girl is giving in and is not so strong anymore. Has she enough of it?

At the moment I'm struggling a bit with my drawings. I don't really know where to go with them. I'm working at two drawings now which belong together and after these two I have to see where to go next.... My head is faster then my hand can draw, I made so many new sketches but the next day I doubt them already.

girl power

8 March: International Women's Day.
Make sure that the future for girls is bright, equal, safe and rewarding!

or rainy days

Despite my last post, we didn't get much sun this weekend. Only saturday we saw a little bit of what spring can bring us and that was it. We made the best of it and on sunday we put the plants outside so the rain could wash of the dust of winter.

the way to the sun

March arrived and the news promised us some more sun. I like winter time: dark evenings, snow, candles and all that, but not the time between two seasons.  The last two weeks it has been very gray and rainy, but not cold anymore. Just so-so-and no more... I'm ready for some more colours, flowers, spring and the sun! And I hope we will get some of it this weekend so we can spend some time outside, enjoying the warmth on our faces.

finally!

Yesterday my pencils arrived, hurrah! So I could finally draw the face of my new Pippi-girl. As soon as I finished the drawing I will post it. I feel a lot better now!

To answer the question of Roberto (and maybe also for some of the new readers of this blog): yes, my drawings are big. 150 x 230 cm, if you want to see the proportions, take a look at this post.

temporary fix

For the last 3 weeks I'm working on the same drawing. Although working is not the correct word, I'm more staring at it and getting frustrated. And why? Because I have no pencils left! When I started I picked a colour red by Derwent Artist pencils to draw with and off course two weeks later the shop over here took them out of their selection. I can still order the pencils so about a month ago I did, but this time something went wrong and I'm still waiting. I already got a pencil extender so I can use almost every bit of the pencil. But I can't draw a face this way. Last week I was so tired of this situation that I started a search on the internet and it's pretty impossible to get the pencils in The Netherlands, or you have to pay a lot of forwarding charges. Now I found a shop in Germany and hopefully I have them by tomorrow so I can start drawing again! 
I wishyou all I nice weekend and sorry for this whining post...

like the best of men

I finished a new drawing. I like the energy in this one, the way she moves. I also find it kind of funny with a scary touch. Maybe more like a cartoon or so....
Do you even recognize what it is that she is holding in her hands? I was just wondering about that, because the perspective is a bit twisted.

present to past

Yesterday I found this old polaroid picture of me. I'm 11 years old and dressed as Pippi Longstocking. I totally forgot about that and that I loved to have my hair that way. It's my own hair and my mother did a great job creating it. Nobody was allowed to touch it or even come near me. Now I know were the inspiration for my drawings comes from...

thinking about rainbows

a tale or flirty words

Next week is valentine's day. I don't know how you think about it, but I think it's just business, to make us buy a lot of stuff we don't need. And if you with someone I think it's more a surprise if you get something by surprise, on an ordinary day. The only thing I like about valentine, is that there's a chance that you have  secret admirer and you find a card with no name in your mailbox. But that never happened to me, so... I wish you all a nice weekend, if you celebrate valentine or not!

and winter comes

My little holiday is over and it was great. We went to a national park were you can make wonderful walks. And if you're lucky and it's very cold and snowy, you can sleigh and do some ice-skating. And in the week before we left, winter started over here! The weather was perfect, just very cold and the landscape beautiful. And because I love snow, I wanted to make something. Just to bad: the snow wouldn't stick. I couln't build I giant Pippi-snow-girl out of it. So I tried to make a polar bear coming out of the water, haha!

places to go

I'm going away for a couple of days, a small holiday, discover a part of The Netherlands that I don't know yet. Hopefully to get some rest in my busy head and stop thinking about all kind of stuff. I wish you all a very nice weekend and a good start in the new week. Thank you all for your nice and sweet comments on my posts about the exhibition, my mother and the website. It means al lot me that you take the time to write something.