Coffee Charred Landscape

"Because of the routines we follow, we often forget that life is an ongoing adventure. We leave our homes for work, acting and even believing that we will reach our destinations with no unusual event startling us out of our set expectations. The truth is we know nothing, not where our cars will fail or when our buses will stall, whether our places of employment will be there when we arrive, or whether, in fact, we ourselves will arrive whole and alive at the end of our journeys. Life is pure adventure and the sooner we realize that, the quicker we will be able to treat life as art: to bring all our energies to each encounter, to remain flexible enough to notice and admit when we expected to happen did not happen. We need to remember that we are created creative and can invent new scenarios as frequently as they are needed."
~ Maya Angelou - 'Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now'

A daily practice of sketching and painting gives you a chance to exercise the big three P's - practice, practice, practice!


"Charred Landscape" - Coffee and watercolour on Bockingford 300gsm watercolour paper
- 12" x 8"

Another exploration into the world of painting with coffee - I really love the natural, earthy colour it imparts and here I used it for the tree and all of the fore-ground, and got a bit bolder, using watercolour for the sky and mountains. The very dark parts on the tree and the trunks is achieved by dipping my brush into the very strong residue at the bottom of the glass and it actually dried to a rich, thick sheen, not visible on the scan. For the white areas I used art masking fluid, removing it afterwards (I just *love* peeling that stuff from the paper and my fingers!) and softening the stark white with a bit of coffee.

This is a depiction of our South African landscapes after the ravages of all the veld fires we have during winter.

Forest drama

Forest Drama - Watercolour in Moleskine Watercolour Sketch-book - 5" x 8"

Winter here in Tarlton (Gauteng, South Africa) is always dramatic and spectacular. Once the green fields of summer turn yellow and dry, and after the veld fires have swept the landscape, we are left with gorgeous contrasts of greens, blacks and browns, starkly contrasting with the bright blue of winter skies.

Despite our fire breaks and the fact that our grass had been cut, our smallholding did not escape the ravages of the veld fires this year - it swept through our property in the small hours of the morning, leaving a charred landscape in its wake and the acrid smell of smoke in the air.

I took a walk down to the Blue Gum forest at the bottom of our smallholding (8.5ha), and did this sketch of some trees that had been caught in the fire, a drama that plays itself out year after year.

Trees and singing hills

“May brooks and trees and singing hills join in the chorus too,
and every gentle wind that blows send happiness to you.”
- Irish Blessing

A daily practice of sketching and painting gives you a chance to exercise the big three P's - practice, practice, practice!


Watercolour in Moleskine watercolour sketchbook - 8" x 5" - Maree©

A scene a couple of kilometers from where I live - a gravel road through Tarlton (South Africa) on the way to Randfontein. It's a short-cut we often take past all the veggie and flower farms, the rubbish dump where all the Seagulls (600km from the coast!) gather and where tall Blue gum trees flank the road. Here you will find many old farmsteads dating back to the 1800's and early 1900's, but unfortunately most of these have fallen into disrepair and neglect and are more and more making way for more modern and comfortable homes.

There is also a vlei (marsh) area here that extends for many kilometers all the way to Tarlton and the hills fairly sing with the sound of birds and waterfowl. I presume this was the original feed for the Tarlton Dam, which is now empty, broken and no longer in existence, although the water still flows down the course during heavy periods of rain.

The Proud little Black Wattle

“A man doesn't plant a tree for himself. He plants it for posterity.”
- Alexander Smith



This young little Black Wattle tree at the bottom of our smallholding is earmarked for eradication, together with a couple of others that have sprung up again since the last clean-up. It's a constant and on-going battle against this alien, Australian species which spreads like wild fire if left unattended, threatening our indigenous trees and grasses. I decided we'll leave the dead one as it's a favourite look-out point for the Fiscal Shrike.

See the previous post about the ongoing battle against Black Wattles

Gum Forest 0n 84

Approaching a tree we approach a sacred being who can teach us about love and about endless giving. She is one of millions of beings who provide our air, our homes, our fuel, our books. Working with the spirit of the tree can bring us renewed energy, powerful inspiration, deep communion.
- Druid Tree Lore

A daily practice of sketching and painting gives you a chance to exercise the big three P's - practice, practice, practice!


"Gum Forest on 84" - watercolour on Bockingford 300gsm - 9" x 12" - Maree©

A suggestion of a Blue gum forest - colour put directly onto the paper without any prior sketching. (The "84" in the title is the number of the smallholding where I live.)

This sketch is bigger than the rest of the Gum Forest Series, which is 5.5" x 7.5", and here I'm exploring the same method of not sketching and just using colour to suggest the image, just going bigger. It's easy putting colour on a smaller painting - the bigger you go, the more colour you have to mix and the quicker you have to paint - I also invested in two new round Winsor & Newton BIG brushes - no's 24 and 28 - I'm sure one gets bigger, but that was the biggest size Pen & Paper in Clearwater Mall had. Now I need a bigger flat - I've got a Nylon Daler ¾" - I probably need a 1"?

Thinking Big!

“The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me.”
- Ayn Rand


"Rain in the gum forest" - watercolour on Bockingford 300gsm - 20" x 39" - Maree©

This is my first foray into BIG! A familiar subject, trees... There's something so scary and intimidating about a huge, pristine white piece of paper staring at you - putting that first splash of colour feels almost like sacrilege, like I'm defacing something pure and wonderful. But as the colour started to take over, I confidently worked faster, thinking about my own advice on fear - what's the worst that can happen?

Do I fear wasting the paints? What would happen if I did? I’d get more. I’d move on. I’d live.

Do I fear spoiling the paper? What would happen if I did? I’d crumple it up and throw it away. I'd get some more. I’d live.

And so I bravely worked with big, bigger than what I'm used to anyway, brush strokes, finally seeing it all come together. Whew!

I did a practice sketch of these trees on our smallholding, shortly after a downpour, and did the painting from that. I just could not see myself out in the bush with the easel and this big piece of paper!

Gum Forest 7

Just think of the trees: they let the birds perch and fly, with no intention to

call them when they come and no longing for their return when they fly away.

If people's hearts can be like the trees, they will not be off the Way.

- Langya

A daily practice of sketching and painting gives you a chance to exercise the big three P's - practice, practice, practice!

"Gum Forest 7" watercolour on Bockingford 300gsm - Maree© (no sketching)

Size : 7.5" x 5.5"

(This Series is for sale on my SALES BLOG)

The seventh in the Gum Forest series of 8 where I've been experimenting with not doing any sketches before painting, just putting colour directly onto the paper and seeing what develops. As I put in the preliminary washes, I was envisaging the closeness of the trees in our Blue gum forest and left a lot more clear paper before starting on the next colour phase.

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Black Wattles in Tarlton

The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

A daily practice of sketching and painting gives you a chance to exercise the big three P's - practice, practice, practice!


"Tarlton Black Wattles" watercolour on Bockingford 300gsm (no sketching) - Maree©
Size : 12" x 9"

The Black Wattle trees on our smallholding in Tarlton, Gauteng, South Africa, which we are trying our utmost to eradicate, have put up the most spectacular show of browns with their millions of seed-pods in between the greens. How can we even begin to think to destroy such beauty? Yet, for the survival of our own indigenous flora, it is a task we undertake every year in a bid to save some of our own natural growth.

Read more about the Black Wattle struggle HERE.

This old stump on 84...

People in suburbia see trees differently than foresters do. They cherish every one. It is useless to speak of the probability that a certain tree will die when the tree is in someone's backyard .... You are talking about a personal asset, a friend, a monument, not about board feet of lumber.
- Roger Swain



This old stump is a relic from one of the blue Gums on our property sawn down many years ago, and now plays host to some moss and a lonely fern leaf. Was wondering if I should add a bit of soil, and maybe some compost? Would that be interfering with Mother Nature?

Sunrise in Tarlton

“Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.”
- Martin Luther

A daily practice of sketching and painting gives you a chance to exercise the big three P's - practice, practice, practice!


Sunrise in Tarlton - watercolour on Bockingford 300gsm - Maree©
Size 9" x 12"

The sun rising through our Blue gum forest on Sunday morning - the flowers are a wish for the New Year!

Sketching in soft-cover books

Blue gum tree in soft-cover book

I'm feeling a bit distracted these days - I get like that when I've got a lot on my plate - besides sketching daily, doing larger paintings once or twice a week and my Private Daily Journal - I've also started an on-line art class with Cathy (Kate) Johnson on "Keeping an Artists' Journal" and I'm also participating in a sketch-book exchange between South Africa and Australia, which you can read about on Artists' Circle.

To centre my thoughts and ground my energy a bit, I took and old soft-cover book with me to record little sketches of grasses, weeds and indigenous flowers on our property. Before I started on the grasses, I couldn't resist doing a quick sketch of this Blue gum tree - I'll use the sketches that I do in these soft-covers as reference for larger paintings at a later stage.

Bonsai

"Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a flying:
And this same flower that smiles today,
Tomorrow will be dying."

A daily practice of sketching and painting gives you a chance to exercise the big three P's - practice, practice, practice!


My 1982 Natal Fig Bonsai (Ficus Natalensis) watercolour in Daler-Rowney 190gsm Sketchbook - Maree©

I acquired by Natal fig bonsai in 1985 when he was 3 years old and about 6" tall - through the years he's been transplanted into various bigger containers, but this year I'll just be freshening him up and adding some new soil and do some feeding.

Now summer is here! and it's time for spring-cleaning - the garden, the house (curtains - I've only got 3!), and everything else in sight, including my Bonsai.

The Japanese word "bonsai" is translated to "tree in a bowl" and is an art form symbolising many things. To some it is considered the link between heaven and earth, to others it symbolises the balance between man and nature. Attending to Bonsai creates peace and tranquility and is a great stress reducer.

Variation on a theme

bright | babbling brook | winter closing its cold hand

Following on Donald Maier's post "Plein Air vs Photos", I decided to also try a 'variation on a theme', using two paintings that I did plein air as inspiration for something new. I've never thought of doing the same painting twice, so thanks for the inspiration Donald!

The one below was my first painting of a neighbour's trees, sitting behind the fence on our side of our smallholding.

"A Neighbour's Trees"

The second time I did the painting (below), I asked the owner's permission to paint the trees from inside his property, sitting with my back against the fence. Not a great distance between me and my subject and, as the trees are situated on a little hillock, I was looking up the slope towards the trees. Very similar to my first painting above.

"Rocky Outcrop"

It was a nice warm day, no wind, slight nip in the air, but I got totally engrossed and only packed up when I decided I had fiddled enough. Every time I looked up, there was another little rock I had missed!

In the painting below, done in my studio, I decided to add a stream, as I feel I need some more practice in that field. Water (and clouds!) is always a great challenge for me.

"Cold Winter Stream" pencil sketch and watercolour - Maree© 25th July 2009
9" x 12"

I've been contemplating using oils again, so I will be using some of my watercolours for inspiration before trying my hand at oils plein air.

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Rock Challenge - Rocky Outcrop

“We all have 10,000 bad drawings in us. The sooner we get them out the better.” 

― Walt Stanchfield 

"Rocky Outcrop" - watercolour on Visual 140gsm watercolour paper - Maree©

My neighbour has this little rocky outcrop with a couple of lonely trees on his property, and I painted  it a couple of days ago, sitting behind the wooden fence, but yesterday I summoned up the courage and asked him if I could come in to do the painting again. It was a nice warm day, no wind, slight nip in the air, but I got totally engrossed and only packed up when I decided I had fiddled enough. Every time I looked up, there was another little rock I had missed!

This is part of Jeanette's rock challenge which ends on the 4th August 2009. If you are interested, you can visit Jeanette's blog at Illustrated Life to participate, there are still a couple of days left.

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Trees - Pencil Sketch for Tree Challenge

Artists who seek perfection in everything are those who cannot attain it in anything.

Gustave Flaubert

"Old Bluegum Tree" - pencil sketch on Bockingford 300gsm watercolour paper - Maree©

Another entry for the Tree Challenge on Vivien's blog - An old Blue gum tree on our smallholding, ravaged by lightning and fire.

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