Girl in red dress
Just some red-dressed girls on this bright sunny morning.
Same subject, eight totally different works!
Monday hero: Emily Jo Gibbs
Alot of images this time, but I really couldn't choose what to show of the beautiful work of the British artist Emily Jo Gibbs.
Gibbs creates her work by embroidering silk organza onto linnen.
I have extra reason to be interested in Gibbs' work, as for two years now I have a little project going with writer/friend Anke Kranendonk, where we exchange 'letters' that are embroidered, knit, or otherwise crafted. Above is an example of one of my 'letters', an ode to my first needlework teacher. It is not as dreamily refined as Gibbs' work, but stems from the same love for the material.
Talk about my work
Last sunday, february 3d, I was asked to explain my printing technique at Galerie de Ploegh in Amersfoort. I also told about using this technique in my illustrations.
You have already missed this little lecture, but there is something on at De Ploegh every sunday afternoon during the Grafiekmanifestatie exhibition.
Follow the link above to find out what.
Monday hero: Duncan Shanks
This is the work of the Scottish painter Duncan Shanks (1937).
It is from the project 'Drawing the year', a project I am slightly jealous of....
But I'm more jealous of his way of painting, it is lovely!
Monday hero: George Shaw
No, not the writer George Bernard Shaw, but the painter George Shaw.
This British artist was born in Coventry in 1966.
A lot of his work was painted in and around Tile Hill, the Coventry suburb where he grew up.
No England's Green And Pleasant Land in his work!
This is about that other England, of outmoded housing estates, held together by at most yet another loveless coat of paint.
Who was it that said an ugly subject could make a beautiful work? Degas?
Shaw's work is proof that this is so.
Book signing
Koos Meinderts and me signing our books at the NOT, or Dutch Education Fair here in Utrecht, in the stand of Hoogland & van Klaveren publishers.
Monday hero: Carel Weight
Carel Weight (1908-1997) was a British painter.
He painted a lot of portraits, like the beautiful women's portraits above. What strikes me is how much room he gave the figures in these portraits.
Weight also made actual landscapes and city scenes, in which he painted imagened figures.
There is often a sort of impending doom in these paintings, as if the figures might come to harm.
Snow is forecast!
If it has to be winter, let's at least have a good layer of snow!
(illustration: Annette Fienieg; Winter, 2019)
Monday hero: Alex Colville
The Canadian artist Alex Colville (1920-2013) is one of the painters whose work I have never seen for real. But when I come across images of his work, I linger.
His work is realistic, but his viewpoints make it very special: people, normally often the subject, are obscured in his paintings by cats, dogs and objects.
Almost like failed photographs.
But then utterly beautiful!
Grafiekmanifestatie exhibition
From January 13 till March 10, at De Ploegh gallery in Amersfoort the yearly Grafiekmanifestatie will be held.
Various artists have made a print or other work specially for this show, to be sold at the very special price of €133,-!
Beside these other works will be on show.
Artists include Maartje Strik, Gea Karhof, Frits Nolte, Bea van der Heijden, Monica de Jong, Peter van den Akker and many more.
Every sunday during the exhibition, there will be special events. I will be giving a little talk about my work as an artist and illustrator on February 3 at 15.00.