Back on the small island called Bornholm out in the middle of the Baltic Sea.
Right now I am spending four days sketching and hiking on a smal island in the middle of the worlds largest brakish water sea between Russia, Denmark and a few other countries.
Here are a few of my sketches so far… and the little girl is my daughter up in her backpack
Bit of an experiment this – posting from my mobile phone
14 may,2010
Today, (1 may 2010), just a short day hike to a waterfall. (Dondalen – Bornholm)
A few sketches from my Moleskine sketch book
The world is getting smaller sometimes…
accidental encounter
Day hike out of central Copenhagen 2. Marts 2010
Break and Watercolors in the snow
Nice and sunny day today, managed to walk a few hours (around 18 km. ) Solo walking in a very nice winter scenery, even though spring is getting closer and temperatures crawling up above freezing.
Here is a boot and my watercolors as I sat down to take a break
Yesterday (3 February 2010) I was out in the snow, sketching with my Moleskine book. Even though it was freezing cold I still managed to get a few sketches down before the water froze on the paper.
I was out there for around 5 hours, doing a few sketches and this little video of my walk:
My Moleskine book in the snow
Sketching snow tracks in the snow
Here are some of the sketches from the walk (approx. 5 hours )
Sketch of a tree
sled riding kids
As I was working I started getting the small ice crystals in the paint, as it can be seen here (vague)
I did a few more:
Woman with her dog
Finally I did this experiment, sketching a guy that passed by me, fast in watercolors to work with the way they froze: (Click on the image to see it large size)
Guy that passed by me, watercolors
Good day out sketching, even though the temperature was around 1-5 degrees Celsius
I especially like the change when the water is not drying up, but freezing – even though it gives a bit of trouble when the papers are put on top of each other (as can be seen in the last one)
Today (21 January 2010) I did a walk with my Moleskine sketchbook and watercolors, to the old Hippie world of Christiania, where the Hippies still try to live according to the dreams they agreed on, almost 40 years ago.
Here are my watercolor sketches from today:
Small hippie shop in Christiania - Copenhagen
By mistake I burned the sketch in the edge, when I tried to dry it on one of the open fires they have on the street
Two guys talking between a couple of large wood sculptures
It was freezing cold, lots of snow on the ground and my hands getting numb, so decided to go inside on a small cafe called “the moon-fisher” for a glas of tea.
The Hippie cafe "moon fisher" at Christiania (Moleskine sketch)
Back outside, I was heading down to the water, starting to sketch the amazing houses at Christiania
Christiania house between the old Copenhagen defense earth walls
Getting all the way down to the water, it was frozen and brave parents where trying to clear the snow from the lake to make a small ice skating area for the kids, while the low winter sun where disapearing behind the city (last watercolor sketch)
Kids ice skating in front of the Christiania houses down to the lake
It have been a cold day, today, but great to be outside and start to experimenting with combining walking with watercolor sketching in my Moleskine sketchbook… again
Getting ready and warming up
sketch of a rhino - watercolor
Starting up my watercolors 2010, and did the first sketches today to warm up… just a few animal studies of elephants, rhinos and Giraffes, from books, sitting inside , here are a few of them:
Condor - detail-head
giraffe studies
group of elephants
hope to get out tomorrow with my watercolors – even though it is freezing cold and snowing.
Seven rough sketches from my notebook
Today I went out to the airport with my daypack and watercolors to get a bit of practice.
First I hang out a bit at the Starbrucks cafe, an airport is a special place and I kind of enjoy watching people arrive and leave for far away destinations.
I was out to check my gear and do a few sketches, and prepare for longer hikes. So it was just a short hike, to a small fishing village close by, called Dragoer.
With me I had my Moleskine sketchbook and my watercolors, here are the sketches before the rain made me find shelter in a small cafe’ with warm applepie and good tea. Here are the rough sketches from today:
Started out from the Copenhagen Airport
Worked with ink, experimenting with using watercolors with the ink.
Walking along the fence
The beginning was filled with impressions from the large scale of the planes and a lot of noise.
The Oresund Bridge
Ate lunch looking out at the huge bridge, quiet autumn weather, looked like rain, but still dry
Fishing village in front of me
The ferries to Sweden used to leave from out there, but now the bridge is there the ferries have gone
Following a small path along the water
The houses along the water was both beautiful and old, I really liked the next one:
Strange narrow house overlooking the coastline
Went back to pure watercolors for this one, think that is still my favorite way to work…
About this time it started to rain and I went into the village and waited for the paper to dry on a small cafe.
Street in the village
I did the last sketch, when I found a place where I was almost out of the rain.
The sketches today was a bit different as I used more ink than I normally do, nice to get back out and get back to the notebooks
15km. of walking and a few experimental sketches in my Moleskine today
Door in one of the old industrial mills along the stream
After working with illustrations all morning, I have been twisting a bit around today, as I tried to find my balance between watercolors, ink and pencil in my work, and also keep a rhythm between walking and painting on my hike. So on the painting part I felt challenged today.
But the walking was superb with beautiful trails along 600 years old Oak trees and a small quiet stream (Moelle-aaen – Denmark) and all the way, forest and soft, easy walking. I also came by quite a few mills today. And it kind of stroke me that when the motives are really nice and romantic, they are so much harder to do – almost like the classic trouble of painting a sunset – that is really, really difficult as it almost always ends up looking like a very poor copy of the real thing.
Here are a selection of my Moleskine sketches from today:
Some of my thoughts on watercolor painting gear
Painting in the rain - with as little gear as possible
I have finally gotten old enough to admit to the “Less is more”, that they kept telling us on the architect school, where the old architect professors, with shaking hands, looked at watercolors as old friends in a way, that I think, no one will ever look at AutoCAD.
watercolor sketch from a hike in Sweden - Kullaberg
Most of those old architects had spend years sketching and painting outdoors in the days before it all went digital around year 2000. And I was lucky enough to be, – maybe the last generation there, who learned the basics of sketching, ink and watercolor, before it all disappeared.
Ever since that time I have loved my watercolor gear and the simple fact that all you need is just a few colors, some paper, water and a brush… and most of all that the changes of weather, the wind, sun and temperature is suddenly something you have to take into account – in a way that is very different from working on a computer screen.
My Equipment:
Snapshot of my gear on a hike
Easel
A few times I bring an easel – but most of the time it just gets in the way, easier just to sit on the backpack. When I bring it I have a metal type one that easy can be tilted in the right angle for the water to flow… or stop flowing.
Colors
I normally use the small winsor&Newton half pans colors but as I run out of the originals I normally use tube-color in the same artist quality of the brands I can get my hands on: Rembrandt, Maimeri, etc. – I just fill up the pans as it is much cheaper. And I use as many different onces as I can grab.
using layers of color and the white of the paper
Brushes
The one place I am not compromising is with my brushes – it dosn´t have to be the series 7, winsor newton, ( I gave up on those as I realized my 4 years old daughter liked to use them when I didn’t look. ) but I stay with sable brushes as I have never met anything that can compare, and I only use them for watercolor as ink will destroy them very fast.
Papers
For papers, I also use whatever is thick and won’t darken if exposed to years of sunlight, mostly in A4 size. Cotton paper is nice, but I finally realized that it is not going to make me a better artist. Most of the time I work in papers between 200 and 300grams.
Moleskine Sketchbooks
I am still trying to figure out why I like the Moleskine books so much, (moleskine.com). There is quite a lot of hype around them, and it might be a bit like all the other Italian things – you don’t quite know why are so great.
To my experience, they are not that easy to work with, but I still end up buying them… even though they are very expensive – don’t quite know why I have gotten so attached to them.
But there is one very nice thing about them – and that is that there are a lot of on-line places, communities and web-sites to look at other peoples work in Moleskine books – just take a look at this one for a start.
sketches in a lined moleskine book (classic)
Water
I have been using small Nalgene bottles (plastic bottles) for a few years now as they lock very good, they work perfect and are cheap and unbreakable, I use the 125ml/4 oz size, but you can get them in lots of different sizes.
Stuff I gave up on…
I used to carry around expensive sitting chairs, chairs that combined as backpacks, easels that had a small room for papers and colors, large amounts of Canson Arches cotton papers (outrageously expensive and very addictive) and other fancy stuff.
But then I saw some of the works of the old watercolor masters that were so incredible much more experienced and better than me – and the equipment they used, looked so simple and worn out… So I am finally starting to understand what they tried to teach me for years on the Academy – that less is more – at least when it comes to painting watercolors.
One of the watercolor artists I admire
Watercolor by John Singer Sargent
And to see how far one can reach in watercolors – check out this detail in a watercolor by John Singer Sargent (1856-1925) – one of the Worlds All time best Watercolor painters.
So, by now I try to minimize my gear, using less and less, as it is much easier to concentrate on painting when I don’t have to spend time picking between ten different kind of papers, brushes and colors… ( colors is the only place I have decided to carry a lot of different, as they are all unique and their flow, transparency, way they dry up etc. are so important.
