around the world

A few months ago The Great Roberto came up with an idea. He would start drawing on a card and send it to me. I continue drawing and send it to the next person. 5 Persons participated on this wonderful project and the fun thing was that all 5 of us started a card. So 5 cards were posted and started their journey around the world. This weekend I got my card back that I started and it was excited to see what the others had made of it.  I really enjoyed this project. People I only know because of their blogs, started something "real". I now have a card with drawings of 4 people around the world and I really like that... Thank you Roberto, Stefanie, Hedwig and Rossichka.      

On the back of the card we each wrote something to the drawing or just what came up into our mind, to start a story you maybe can read when seeing the drawing:

picture perfect...

...well, almost. I found a new love: drawing in my photo's. I always liked taking photo's, but I don't think I'm very good at it. And now I discovered Instagram. I don't know why, but putting my photo's out there this way, makes it easy and I just have so much fun doing it. And that is something I also discovered lately: I like making things that make me feel good, no "heavy art" work or girls with guns. And that is something new. I found out that I made this kind of art with a message as I personally felt good. Now I don't feel very good (but don't worry;-) and I want to make "feel good" stuff. Before this gets to much inside my head: if you want to see more photo's like this, click here.
And yes, that is me in the photo...

say what?

I want to show you the first two, new pieces of jewelery I made for my shop. They are made of wood and I drew on it. I want to make a series of them and they have all the same concept: words or a quote in combition with a drawing of an animal. I wanted these animals not to be very realistic, more funny or so... The words in the picture above mean "fuck happiness" which rhymes in dutch and is one of my favourites as I told you before over here. I must say I enjoy making these pieces and I like how they turned out. What do you think?

drawing challenge

This weeks host for the drawing challenge is Kristen and her theme is "Solstice". I think it's a beautiful theme and very well choosen for this time of the year. I had to think very hard what it meand to me, do I have traditions or mind sets with the changing seasons, do I have plans? Funny is that I always have to think about the word "midsummer" and country's like Sweden or Norway. Pictures of places where is doesn't get dark, dancing around tree's and fairy's, haha! I realized that I don't do anything special at this point of the year, only hoping that we get some kind of summer and a couple of nice days or even weeks! The last few years our summers in The Netherlands were really bad, before you knew it was already fall. We were happy with 6 days of sun! So for this solstice I dream of reading a good book while sitting in the grass, enjoy the sun and just let the time go by. Please give us some weeks of summer!

For more changing of the seasons please go the sunny spot (what a perfect name the blog has for this challenge!).

go back and forward

That is the question.... back to my drawings, forward with something else or both... At the moment I'm not sure what to do, so I try not to think to much about it and just let see what will happen. The truth is I hate that feeling! At least I gave the girl in my drawing a pair of sunglasses, becauses sunny it's going to be this week and that's good news. I wish you all a good start in this new week!

about days off, real life and beautiful gifts

This week I had a few days of so I tried to relax and do some nice things.  At day one we went to beach. The weather was so beautiful ans sunny but we froze our ... of because there was so much wind, haha! We didn't bring our sweathers because in the city it was really nice and as we arrived at the beach we wondered why all the people came back and didn't stay. Well, we found out as soon we saw some sand, brrrr!

At day two I went to an exhibion and I saw the work of Nelleke! It was really nice to see it in "real life" and I also met Nelleke, which was really fun because we follow each other for a while now here in blog-land and we know things about each other and now we each have a face to go with it!

I also went to an exhibition in Amsterdam about Pixar which was really gooooood! You can see the sketches, drawings, paintings and storyboards they make for each movie. So it's not about the finished movies, but the work they do before that. All the hand-made drawings. And wow these people can draw! That was really inspiring. Unfortunately you're not allowed to take pictures, but this little guy wanted to come home with us and took a look arround in the train:

And the perfect ending for my days off was when I came home and a package of Stefanie arrived. I'm now the proud owner of some postcards, her beautiful little booklet and some jewelery made by her. Men, I'm happy! Thank you Stefanie!

my paintings as jewelery

When I opend my studio about 3 weeks ago I got a lot of reactions to my paintings. And then the next day it just hit me: why did I never made jewelery of the images of my paintings? They are so colourful en strong I don't have to make new images. So I tried how they would like if they became so small and it works perfect! At least I think so. If you like them you can click here for my shop and see the close-up pictures.

drawing challenge

This weeks host is Ariane and her theme is "mood bord". I never made a mood bord in the way it's ment to be I guess. I see myself as a walking mood bord, haha! My head is full of images for different situations and thinks I want to have or do. I have a book for my collection of words and text. My door to my studio is full of images as an inspiaration for my large "pippi" drawings. I collect pictures out of newspapers and magazines. I could have show you all of that, but the line that made me think in the invations of Ariane was "any projects like the redesign of a room or painting or visualisation of a plan for the future". I made a drawing of the visualisation of the future but not exactly: only halve of the plan. The other chair is ment to be for my boyfriend. We're planning to move in together. I don't know when or how it will happen and it's pretty exciting. I'm ready for it and at the same time I'm not, so that's why I'm still alone in the drawing.

For more mood bords go the Ariane's blog and I wish you all a good week!

rabbit hearted girl

Oh I just had to show you these pictures. My rabbit Pollock became a dad, juhuuu! About 3 weeks ago these adorable bunny's were born and now I could visit them without disturbing the mother, who lives next door. 2 of them have the grey colour of the mother and 5 of them look exactly like Pollock!

drawing challenge

This weeks host for the drawing challenge is Renilde and her theme is "key/hole". I don't know why, but I thought about a lot of rooms together, with a lot of keys, like hotels. Maybe because I need a break, haha!  So I made a key that should keep people out of your room. Now I think about it, I made the opposite of a key. And I'm still a bit inspired by the last challenge about words. Well, I hope I could at least make you smile...

For more keys, go to the beautiful blog of Renilde!

they seem so very tough

I'm still a bit in the vibe of the last drawing challenge and playing with drawing and words. This one can be read in many ways I think. Maybe a bit to serious for post number 301! Juhuuuu!

drawing challenge

These weeks host of the drawing challenge is Patrice and her theme is Proverb or Saying. Or any other text or sentence that means something to you or in your work. Well.... I don't have a favourite sentence: I have a whole booklet! I already told you once that I collect sentences or text pieces that inspire me. I'm very bad with words, so I collect them and then make something new out of them. I always have been fascinated by drawings or paintings with text pieces in them. I also made a lot of these drawings. Especially the ones I make on the computer. I like to play with it and see where the text can fit into the drawing and become a part of it. Some of them become very personal and others have my theme: woman in art and how they are threated and judged and so on. My favourite line is "Whatever kind of art I'll make, it will be labeled feminine". Just to bad that that is my favourite one, but as long as I meet people who think that's important to tell me so, I feel the feminist inside me, haha! Also important: humor, as in the drawing on top. And a little bit in the second one, humor and a little bit true. And last but not least: a picture of one of the cabinets I made a few years ago, some of them I already posted. A combination of drawing and a small object. The text is "fuck geluk" in reversed writing which means fuck happiness in dutch, but in dutch it rhymes and sounds funny. I like it especially when I'm angry and those "happy people" irritate me, sorry...

I just noticed I wrote a lot here...mmmm, Patrice I think your theme made me think again about some things! Please check out her blog for all the players in this challenge!

a sweet memory

For the last 3 days you could visit my home and my work. Most of the local artist opend their doors for public. I put some work in front of the house, so people could see that there was something happening and that they`re welcome to visit. And yes, that's me in front of the garage;-) I put a lot of my paintings in there as you can see in the next picture:

After that you enter the sun room where I put a table with the jewelry I make and a mannequin who's wearing a t-shirt with one of my designs:

I had some really busy days but it was worth it! Lots of people visited my place and I got some really nice and good comments, some discussions, sold some things and maybe a new exhibition coming up. I just wanted to show you a tiny impression and now I have to clean the house and bring everything back to it's original place and eveything is back to normal. I wish you all a good week!

drawing challenge

Liebe Stefanie, this one is for you! I hope you don't think or feel that I crossed a line here, that it's to personal, but I wanted to make a drawing for you and your brother Philipp. I hope you have some beautiful memories of you two and I tried to draw one: two children playing in the garden in the summer, posing for their father or mother who wants to take a picture. Of course I don't know how you two looked like as children, so I made them a little abstact. I want to give you something happy and not sad.

For more participants, please visit Stefanie's beautiful blog!

Before the real challenge

The next drawing challenge is hosted by Stefanie and she has a theme that can be interpreted in many, many ways: Philipp, a fillip. I thought, Philipp means the friend of horses. So you might let yourself be inspired by...? The music and the lyrics by muse, the name, your brother, a horse, a fingerplay, isn´t that fillip enough?

So I just finished this drawing for my society6 shop and I thought that it just fitted perfectly in a weird way to post it as a early input, haha! If you like this one, you can order it at my shop as a t-shirt, bag, pillow or print.

drawing challenge

This weeks host for the drawing challenge is Barbara and her theme is "smell"! A very interesting one because smell has everything to do with feelings and senses and what it does to you. You can smell something and remember something you thought you forgot, or travel back in time to your childhood. There are a lot of beautiful smells, like rain after a sunny day, or the smell of your skin in the sun, fresh baked bread or appels with cinamon. As I started drawing I realized my drawings are not that positive as the things I thought of... I let you decided;-) I think it has to do with the fact that my sense of smell, lets just say it's very well developed, the same goes for my sense of hearing. So it can turn into something negative very fast, even nice smells or sounds. I drive the people arround me crazy sometimes because they can't smell or hear it.

For more "smelly" things check out Barbara's blog, I'll see you there!

wild cart inside

Just to stay a little bit in the atmosphere of the last drawing challenge (burlesque), I show you one of my paintings with the title "waterfalls and booty calls".

drawing challeng

This weeks host for the drawing challenge is Tania and what a theme! The last theme was "dance" and this week we dance a little slower, sensually and erotically: Burlesque! And I love it, as Tania said: "burlesque is sensuality, is feminity, is playing. Striptease without stripping off completely, showing and hiding, openness and secret, coquetry, frivolity, erotic without obscenity, joy of seduction."
I like the clothes, the music and the fun of it and one of the queens of burlesque Dita von Teese.

For more Burlesque please go to Tania's blog and enjoy, I know I'm curious!

as silly as fun

I just made these glass jars with painted animals on top. I think they look like fun and they make me smile. I want to keep these for myself but I thougt it's nice to make a lot more of them when I have my open studio and sell them. So now my studio is covered with painted plastic animals and I must say they're good company ;-)

drawing challenge

This weeks host for the drawing challenge is Patrice and her fantastic theme is "Dance". I can not tell you how much I love to dance...oh yes I can tell you and I already did at this post, so if you want to read about my love for dancing give it a go! So I don't have to tell you how happy I am with this theme and I just had to post my "little tango bunny". Some of you know her already, but she's perfect for this challenge. She also has a sexy big sister:

If you want to see the versions of these computer-drawings made with watercolour, acrylic and airbrush click here.

For more "dance" go to Patrice's blog and let's dance!