Gifts and a new project

I hope that I can slowly regain my previous tempo of posting stuff.
So here I go!

I have been doing some gifts for friends lately, since some are leaving, and others graduating... Its hard to find good gifts, specially for male friends haha.

Also, recently I met the owner of Pesto Bar here in Amsterdam, and the night we went to have dinner at his lunch room, I doodled a bit. When he sat with us to drink a wine, he told me I shoudl try to hang my stuff at a bar or cafe. So I took his word and yesterday I send an email to a local place that's new and quite edgy. Hope to hear from them soon!

And this is what I'm working on now: Octopus!

And just to end up with a funny sketch, I am enjoying having a dog tons!!! And its hard not to make a big fuss and become one of those people :P But yes, I have lots of ideas to make comics. Though drawing dogs is freaking hard! I have to sit one day and make various studies... 

So yes, Tjido is a bit or a reactive pup, he loves to play and barks for other dogs attention. We're working on it ;)

Sorry!

OMG!
It has taken me a month to update... a new record! I'm soooo sorry!

So since I did not get my job in Spain I have been a bit busy with looking for new jobs, stressing about it, taking the theory driving exam and of course our little "wolf".

But thankfully I have a colour drawing I was trying to save for a decent post but whatever!
EDM Challenge 4! Draw your mug or cup :)

I really like this sketch because I did it with feltip pens which I do not normally use. They also remind me of home, since every trip to mexico I bring a few back.

I also realized that I haven't told you guys I have a Dawanda shop! :D since I am looking for a job, I decided to open my shop and see what I could get. Also a nice way to have another project going on. I will post the link later, but if you are very curious it is called Curly Sketches :P 

Thank you for reading and I promise a decent update at the end of this week!

Autumn has begun

The perks of having a dog include the trips to the forest!
I live quite close to the city's forest, but rarely went there...

Now I have been there 2 weekends in a row! And looking for mushrooms is the best haha.

So of course my autumn drawings are mushrooms. I have been fascinated with them since I found that children's book and did THESE in mixed media. But now some drawings:

To finish this post I am adding some sketches of my dog Tjido, which I am happy about because they are the first and in the end, dogs are hard to draw... I have cheated though :P I used pictures instead of sketching him live. That will be the next challenge! The shape of his muzzle is hard...

Continuation of Mixed Media

As promised I wanted to show you other thing I'm working on with Mixed Media: collage, painting etc.
Sadly I haven't been able to do more drawings, some pre-work stuff and of course our new pooch! :D

First things first!

This is the work in progress of the first painting:

I like the cherry blossom and the same style as previous post with the background lining, ending up in thick lines around the main subject. 

For my second painting, I wanted to use a "mask" as I had seen at a recent post by Caatje's blog. But of course it didn't really go as planned...

Tape basically ripped most paper off hahaha :P

But then I continued and this was the final result. With so much going on in Spain, Greece, Syria, Mexico.. allot of violence on the streets. I thought some lyrics of Calle 13 would be appropriate. 

Finally to end this post I welcome Tjido! "ch-ee-doh" our Icelandic Sheepdog puppy!
I might start a small blog about him, his breed is not very common, and it was quite hard to find information about him apart from the breeding standards and history. I will let you know :)

Thank you for stopping by!

Mixed media painting & A'dam

Hello fellow artists and readers! :D

We are back in the Netherlands! And thankfully we had a few days of sun before it became total autumn...

I cleaned out my art supplies and got excited about drawing and painting again. Although I realized I left 90% of my brushes in Mexico... duh... so i won't see those until x-mas. Sigh.. typical.

But the reason they were left behind is the following mixed media painting :) I am enjoying using old stuff that lies around to add it to my paintings. And well this was done at my parents home, where i found a childhood book about plant that don't flower, like fungi. TOTALLY boring when you are a kid, but it was sooo fun to read now, and the pictures are incredible.

I'm working on another similar piece of mixed media right now as a gift. But I forgot to take a picture of it :P

Finally a quick sketch of my delicious dutch dinner the first week home! :D YUM!
More drawing will be coming since my job has been delayed for a few months due to paperwork- good news since we are picking up our puppy on sunday!!!!!!

Hope you are all doing fine, and enjoy!

Leaving Merida

As inspiration of many sketching blogs that I follow, I tried to make journal-style page. I don't think I can use my sketch book as a journal... maybe because I like to show my drawings, and I guess it will be uncomfortable if there are very personal things written (although drawings can be also very personal, but that depends on how people look at them).

So this is a very simple page with a good-bye to Merida. Yes, we have left. I maybe want to add some colour, but didn't want to take too long before an update :)

My second sketch is a EDM #3 : Draw a bag :) this is my fav bag when I come to Mexico. I always use it! I borrowed it from my mom but never gave it back haha, its a good size bag made of leather and, if i'm not wrong, Guatemaltecan weave as decoration with many earthy coulours.

 As a final remark, thank you again to everyone that visits :) comments are highly appreciated!
I have realized that i never use "Tags" and after visiting other people's blog I have realized how useful they are :P haha, so I will try and start adding those!

Stormy weather and squiggles

A quick post for this week!

This is our last week in Merida, we are leaving in the weekend! I do feel that it is time!
Even though I'm working on a final print here, I wanted to post two sketches. One is inspired in the latest hurricane Ernesto that passed by, thankfully it wasn't too bad. I guess she's a weather/water being, got inspired by an artist I recently follow on facebook's EDM if i'm correct. I really like her style, but her full bodies are much better than mine. I do feel I have a bit of the same crazy imagination haha. Click HERE to check out her website!

And the last one are just squiggles, doodles. But I'm happy to have done this and not only rely on making perfect pictures in my  moleskine :) slowly getting there to free-style sketching haha!

Prints, again dogs and EDM challenge!

As promised, today I want to share with you my prints.
Back in high-school, when I still had the dream to become an artist (before my mom, rest in peace, basically told me to get a "real" degree in the brutal way that mom's can be...) one of my favorite disciplines was printing. We had a huge printer-roller and not only linoleum, but wood and plastic/glass. It was great! Actually, I found a picture of my prints that I send to England at the time for the A levels. (So yeah my mom did put everything I did up on the wall :P)

I never really thought I would do prints again. I had learned of course the classic way with oil based ink and the whole printing machine.. you can't really buy those hahaha. Now in Mexico I refound my tools and found out that its actually very easy to buy linoleum haha, and you can get water based inks! Yay!
The printing machine is still missing, but a good bottle or can has worked as roller.

For those who don't know how this works: (maybe i'll make a real tutorial next time)
- You make a drawing design, preferably on paper (very hard to draw on linoleum)
- Put the drawing face down onto the linoleum and scratch the pencil drawing.
- Start carving!

Here i'm showing you 2 styles, the tricky thing about prints is not only appearing like a mirror image, but you have to think hard as what will be "black" and what will be "white". How do you want to make volume or distance? Thickens of lines and separation are key.

And finally a continuation of the dog comics! We are really excited about it, reading, researching etc about different subjects in having a dog. We have decided on the breed and already have asked for information at their offical association, and we are now on the "list" :) but well, I know we will have allot of comments of people around us thinking we are nuts.

Finally, as you know i was having a bad case of drawings-block. But I must say I found inspiration in the EDM challenges and decided to draw one that I had "added" previously in my sketchbook :) so yeah good idea!

A slow comeback

Agian... late...

I hope you haven't given up on me!

So actually I have been a bit slow since we've been back from vacations. Not much inspiration. I guess also a bit busy with a friend visiting and working on a paper we want to get published from my time in Spain. Kind of cool  as well :)

In the cool news, I have accepted a job offer and will be working when I go back to the Netherlands, and its a nice part time job with the same EU project of Spain! :D My boyfriend and I have also decided to get a dog.. yeah i know! Crazy! I know its a big responsability, but I'm really looking forward to it and reading allot. I think it will be good to have a companion and a good reason to go out! Training the dog sounds also like a good challenge of discipline. Plus, Holland is a perfect place to have a dog! With parks, bicycle lanes, beach close by, etc!

This is why this is the first sketch:

It has been hard work to find the right dog for us. But I think it is good to know what you are looking for and study the different races you had in mind. Allot of people get pets without knowing what they are going for (myself being one of those people with Bob the chameleon). Also nowadays you have so much information and people that are patient enough to maintain a blog with their experiences :) really nice! We have contacted different kennels after deciding on 3 races, and now its down to 2! I will keep you posted!

I also wanted to show you the final product of the snorkeling blog :) (i have to apologize for the quality of the pictures). The moleskine paper is interesting with aquarel, quite a thick paper very different to aquarel paper, i guess its very soft. I hope now I'm back on routine I can get more inspiration from other bloggers! Get a project again! 

Ah yes, and the baby card is a success! It is now being printed for a try-out, and well baby will be born soon so we will receive a picture if this happens before we get back :) And of course you'll get to see it!

Oh and next post I will show you the results from the printing session today!

Back from vacation!

Oh guys!

I'm so sorry I haven't updated in yearsssss haha well, you know I went on vacation to the beach, and that I would make a drawing per day...

I sucked at this.

So between dives, beach and sleeping at 10pm I really didn't get to draw much :( sorryyyyyy I guess it has to do with the fact that I don't want to "ruin" my sketchbook or maybe that i just want to draw when I have an idea and not so much doodle.. I don't know. I think I should try this exercise again.

But anyways, I did draw something! haha

First are there hermit crabs that you see allot in these parts, and following a previous post of a crab carrying a house HERE  I got inspired to make other ideas, other islands. Still haven't decided if I just want to leave them like this or colour them.

This other 2 spread was an idea that Joost got to make a log of the things we saw while snorkeling in a wonderful place called Xcalak, almost at the mexican border with Belice. This picture is in the beginning, I have already added more and coloured them! I will post that picture soon - I just wanted to leave an update!

Hope you enjoy them, more updates to come in following days!!!

Oh and if you're interested in our travels, you can check out the other blog I keep: http://aafkejoost-merida.blogspot.mx/

Back to the old black lines ;)

The countdown begins!
Monday we are leaving on vacation!!! We are heading to Akumal and then to Xcalac- a tiny town at the border with Belice. I'm pretty excited about this. We'll be diving and relaxing at the beach!! Sorry if I'm making you jealous!

But anyway, I have decided to make a challenge for myself: one drawing per day! until we get back to Merida... That will be interesting! :P

Last weekend my boyfriend and I celebrated 2 years together :) we were planning on going to get a romantic lunch, visit a museum and then get a beer. But as always, nothing went as planned. The coffee place was closed, we had breakfast at another venue, the tropical storm started and the museum was being used for an event so it was closed for the public as well.. so we ended up drinking beer at an Irish Pub watching the euro cup at 2pm haha. We then went to the city centre to have dinner, but somehow we weren't feeling that great. Back at home we collapsed in bed feeling swollen and took a nap. It wasn't until 11pm or something that we were feeling normal again and watched a series... so yeah a pretty romantic sunday ;)

My other drawing is just some crazy idea I got. After drawing it I guess it has a bit of Alice in Wonderland feeling, so I wrote a quote of the book in her dress. I decided to bring colour onto it, and I guess i'm pleased about the result! I'm also working on a baby-card project, but of course I can't disclose those pictures until baby is born :)

A bit of everything

Hello everyone,

How are you doing?

This post is a bit of everything. First two sketches are some pages of my new Moleskine :) one has the recipes my cousin sends to me every now and then whole the other is a sketch done from our hotel view in Ria Lagartos (beautiful place!).

I have found a good art shop and bought linoleum sheets and made my dad bring my craving kit ;) so i started with some reptiles. An example are these frogs. I bought water based paint, i have not really worked with it, i have always worked with oil based. So I still dont' have a good print to show.

And the final drawing I'm sharing is also one of the reasons it has taken me a bit long to update. Mexico is going to have presidential elections in July and its becoming a very exciting and a very scary happening. Students started a few months back a movement, called "yo soy 132" against televisions that are favoring one candidate and keeping us in the dark about important information. A dirty war has started from right winged candidates agains the left and I really don't know what will happen if any of the two main men win... well we'll just have to wait and see.

Water colours and sketches

Hello dear friends & readers!

Firstly thank you for the batik tips ;) i have found the wax and a pot to smelt it in. I have done some experiments but still a bit unsure if i should share them haha, a birthday gift went horribly wrong last week :P

But I would like to share my continuation of experimenting with water colours. Actually I'm using chinese ink and water colour pencils. I forgot my water colours you see.. but I think it's working fine. I did this bird and i hope you can give me some tips or suggestions.

On my more comfortable zone of drawing I had this urge to draw Kukulkan or Quetzalcoatl, well a god found in most Mexican pre hispanic cultures. Its a feathered snake, which I think is totally cool. The heads you tend to find are like the one I sketched, and well the little guy is the personification or warrior. In Maya they believed you were born with an animal protector (like horoscope) and of course emperors were normally if not always Jaguars or Eagles, so they had to look the part and they would deform their bodies in order to appear like the animal. Hence the idea.

Next (yeah sorry for the whole legend talks) just a portrait of my boyfriend. Trying to get a grip in the skill of faces, his neck was too long and i think i should do this more often to  train it.

A little adventure

Hello hello!

We've been visiting pyramids the last few weekends here in Yucatan. Mayan piramids. They're incredible, so if you ever have the chance you should visit them :)

On our trips we tend to leave Merida quite early in order to be there before the crowds and it has worked pretty well. Pictures without tourists and many animals that come out in the cool of the morning. Also you get the idea of being a real explorer. This was the inspiration for my drawing today!

I have also been watching a dutch series called O'Hanlons Helden (O'Hanlons Heroe's) which is a serie-documentary about a english man who knows so much about history and biology and all those amazing subjects. In the series he follows the foot-steps of his heroes who where the men that "discovered" gorillas or dinosaurs or Mongolia. It is truly fascinating, funny and in English, if you would like to see it (you can go to VPRO.nl)

So I drew a small explorer. I have to say that many explorers where actually more barbaric than the cultures they discovered. Here in Mexico many pyramids where blown up, libraries burnt and treasures stolen, but I guess it's all part of history. Lets just say that this is a friendly modern explorer like Dora the Explorer hahaha totally harmless!

The last sketch follows my new trauma with cactus and a probable design for my batik experiment (when i find a pot to melt the wax.. any suggestions?)

Please keep commenting, i really do read them all and they make me tons of happy! I didn't reply to last ones (don't want to discriminate some since all i can think about saying is: thank you) but if you have any ideas suggestions or whatever I will! :)