More posts..!

Today a very nice uncle of mine asked me if it could be that I raise a high bar when it comes to images I consider worth posting. ...And I think he's right! It always feels as if the images I post here have to meet a certain standard of excellence...and for what? Or whom you might ask..!?

So in breaking habits, I'll post these scribbles I made today: two caricatures from some old photos of the studentclub.
I liked drawing them!

Catching up...!

A sketch of myself (glad to post something!)...the 'Superstudent'!



Two Peter van Straaten illustrations...real beauties!


and another two panels of 'Mort Cinder', illustrated by the late Alberto Breccia. The comic-book is undoubtedly phenomenal in it's execution and is described in the Wikipedia as "one of the most important comic strips in history". It is considered by many to be Breccia's masterpiece. I sure can understand why.

Blog delay

Hi everyone,

At the moment I'm so busy with my studies that I hardly have any time to draw. I'll try to post something soon (even if it's just scribbles). Thanks for your visits!

More Felix Nadar (1820-1910): Sarah Bernhardt

A real photograph of Gustave Dore??

Yes. Photographed by Felix Nadar.

Don Lawrence's Storm

Of all the Don Lawrence artwork I know, I feel the Storm episode 'The Living Planet' is truly his masterpiece.
Honing his skills through the different stories, in 'The Living Planet' Lawrence seems to be at the apex of his creative abilities. This is portrayed in the incredibly spectacular 'fire-worm' scenes, but to me even more in his depiction of the main characters. In the 'The Living Planet', Storm, Redhair and Nomad are more so than ever before human figures: delicately drawn, gracious and with true emotions.

Look at Redhair for example:




The top image is the oldest of the three, the middle one is from TLP and the lower one is from an episode after TLP. In my taste, the earlier 'Storm'-characters were always a bit 'hairy', with faces drawn in a formalistic fashion..almost as if they were taken from a totem pole. And (after TLP) as the series progresses, it appears as if Lawrence begins to draw more in a caricaturistic way; men are portrayed with overly proportioned muscles and they lose all gracefulness. Redhair's face in TLP however, is smooth and gently shaped.

And look at these emotions...;they are so subtle compared to the earlier and later Storm:





And his figurework: beautiful!



'The Living Planet' is a gem! It shows Don Lawrence to be one of the greatest comicbook artists who ever lived.

Vacation photos

England was a blast!

An old painting, but well...I just LOVE it!

The latest painting...!

Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose

While in London, I saw "Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose" by Sargent, which was....well absolutely stunning! My heart just skipped a beat.
One of these (obviously) is a fake reproduction, plucked from somewhere on the internet, for people who want an original painting in their house...
I can now attest to the often heard statement, that it really pays of, to see paintings in real life, instead of from a picture. It's the same with the above painting. The real painting, compared to this picture, is for example much more turcoise/blue and with VERY intense colours.

As of today I'm also for the first time displaying some of my own paintings at an exposition in Utrecht. And I'm really anxious to see if I can sell a few. One of these paintings I've never put on this blog before, so I'll try to do that soon.

"A quick one"

A quick warm-up sketch in acrylic I made today before I started working on a serious painting. And another image made by the fantastic Jose Ortiz (Moya). Ortiz is truly one of the best draughtsmen in comics you'll ever encounter. This comic is actually titled "Le petit sauvage" and is for sale at almost every comic-convention: it's a real gem full of the most wonderfull pictures!!

I went to the UK this past week and it was great! We visited the Lakedistrict and London..where I saw original Sargent's...what a fortune! I'll post some photos of it soon. Here's a memorysketch of two famous guys and a painting in the 'steigers'.

More practising

Another exercise in Painter

Scribbles

I try to practise a little now in Painter. I don't like the idea of throwing all those scribbles away, but to save them all seems a bit overdone too. So I'll just post them every once in a while.

Yesiree!!!

I'm slowing getting used to the feeling of drawing with a 'mouse pen' on the computer, and I'm loosening up.

Old sketch upgraded

"Doormural"

My "doormural" is ALMOST finished..I'll post the final picture in a week or two.

Woeiiiiee!

Photoshop scribble

I now wonder if it would have been nicer to put one large drop of blood in the background, instead of these little ones?

Anatomy

Starting yesterday, today I finished copying my finest book on human-anatomy for artists..456 pages! Wow, I'm very contend, because it's been such a long time since I really sat down, and STUDIED anatomy. It was like a breath of fresh air to go over all these pages, full of muscles, and pictures covering the human body from almost any angle. I once photocopied my exemplar at home using the book I had borrowed from the library..I had never seen such a detailed and clear book written for artists on anatomy.
Unfortunately, I didn't copy the title of the book, but I know that it is written by Gottfried Bammes, a German artscholar. His own drawings are aesthetically speaking not top-notch, but they are very clear and precise. Alongside his own drawings, in the book their are dozens of sketches from artists from all over history and the text is accompanied by many photographs..it's the BEST book. On amazon.com, you can buy some of Gottfried Bammes books. I think this one most closely approximates my version: "Die Gestalt des Menschen" (Hardcover). See the accompanying picture. Never mind the text is German, because the pictures speak for themselves.

'Blogger pause'

It's late in the evening and I'm still working on a paper...so what you see here is my 'blogger pause'..

Today I watched a bit of the movie Casablanca (never seen it before..argh) and Ingrid Bergman seemed somehow so familiar to me..I didn't understand until I realized that she had a striking resemblance to Isabella Rosellini. I later found out Isabella is in fact the daughter of Ingrid. Here are their pictures (top is Ingrid Bergman) and you can really see how much they look alike.

On a further note..having only seen bits and pieces of the movie, I now understand the relevance of those famous taglines you hear in songs every now and then. Taglines like 'Here's looking at you kid!', 'Of all the gin-joints (...) she walks into mine!' or 'We'll always have Paris'. I always like those kind of quotes; when they originate in popular culture and become a common way of expressing feelings.

Fairytale sketches

Sketches for a fairytale project.

It's kinda strange..; on the one hand drawing these sketches is liberating, in the sense that it's devoid of all difficult elements drawing-wise (is that even a word?). One the other hand, drawing too much of these sketches makes me lazy and perhaps even forgetfull. If I were to draw 'below' the level of complexity I can handle at a certain point in my development, I bet in the long run it will lead to a decrease in quality of my pictures. So it's always necessary to draw your best, to always push the envelope and improve your work -and with that the sophistication and complexity of it.

(btw: it ofcourse requires a lot of energy to do so ;)

Gaspard Caderousse

I've recently read 'The Count of Monte Cristo'. Here's a scribble of Gaspard Caderousse; one of his loathed enemies.

My 'doormural' in progress...more to come!

More reallife practise..!

Two sketches I made today, of my niece and our cat. I coloured her in Painter.

Thumbnails

Thumbnails for a very large painting I'm doing right now for my studentsclub. It's a woman posing in a Mucha-like fiche frame. She's painted as large as a real-life person. When I'm finished I'll take a picture of her with me standing beside her.

Another video

Another video to fill up some space...(mind you, the background-music is a bit annoying)
It was sketched from a fashionmagazine.

QUIST

This photo was taken about a year ago, when I was on a weekend-gettaway with my dispuut "Quist". Within my studentsclub in Utrecht, the dispuut Quist is formed by 24 people with whom I have contact on a more regular basis. Every two weeks we come together and spend the Wednesday evenings; eating, talking, going out, laughing and having a great time! I really like them. By now I've collected many photograph of my dispuut, but this one I fancy alot; it has such great appeal!
(coincidentally it's also my first photo-appearance on my blog ;)

More reallife sketching

Man, I have to do this more often, because I find it difficult and I'm to much out of shape..! I hope to post more sketches from reallife in the next couple of weeks.

Playing with Photoshop

My father in his studio

Interiors

These last two days I've tried my hand at some interior sketching...quite difficult. And a lot of fun!