Melodie

Melodie E. J.
egg tempera and oil on canvas (linen)
70 x 45 cm

That´s another good friend. She´s an artist, too, and originally she´s born in the USA, her mother is from the UK and she´s grown up in the Caribbean (the Dutch part). Now she lives not far from me, but unfortunately she decided to go to the UK. But hey, so I have a place to stay.


And today I´ve received a small parcel. Hmmmm, I´ll not open it before one minute after midnight. It´s not easy. It looks so interesting. Thanks Drachenfrau! *hugs*

these and that

Today I´ve varnished some of my pictures. It´s about time, they´re dry now and I want some protection. And because I was to lazy to do that the last weeks, I have to varnish 11 more. Mph. I´ll do that the next days.

And at the moment there´s a little exhibition of our club. Now my picture "Submerged" is insured with 4000,00 €! My, my. A good friend of mine, A., had that idea, because her father was a well known artist in East Germany. And he told his daughter this amount insured for the exhibition, he said, if something happens he has good money. And because A. loves my pictures and means, they´re similar to her father´s, she decided to specify that amount insured for my picture, too.
She told me that last week. She had a little trouble about it with the director of that institution, but she says that´s normal if you want to show professional art.
OK, I don´t know what to say about it. It´s really nice, of course, that she values my art that high. If it would show the next time on my bank account ... ;-)
I guess that director now looks with horror to my exhibition in september. More than one picture ... *coughs* So they´ll look properly after the pictures. *shrugs*

new picture

Andra Barz
oil, egg tempera, acrylic on stretched canvas (linen)
105 x 120 cm


Now the picture is ready and I didn´t show other progress pictures. I did it on my german blog, but I have to admit, I was quite to lazy to do that here, too.

It´s a portrait of a good friend. She´s a singer, mainly Jazz, but sometimes she sings to my pictures ;-) Her feelings about it or what she thinks, when she looks at it. That´s really exciting.

I´ve decided to paint her in art deco style. I like that time and it suits her, too. It´s noble and faded, lascivious and cool, livelily and dead. You never know, what´s the facade and what´s real.

still in progress

Yesterday I´ve began a new picture - the portrait of a good friend. So today I´ve used some egg tempera for the background ... again I´ve had so much, that three other ones became a new colour.
Normally I don´t post pictures still in progress, so that´s an exception. I don´t know, if I´ll show such a glimpse again. Maybe ... maybe when it´s ready.

Chinese invasion

Yesterday I was at the home of befriended artists, because next week we have a symposium there. My friend Andra was with me and we helped a little bit. Anette, one of the artists, has a lot of contacts to China. So they had guests - three chinese women, one was an artist, too. We had a nice talk, good food, and all in all it was such a nice day. I invited her to come to my home to have a look into my studio. So we decided to do it today.
Well ... today I had a chinese invasion ;-) They always know a lot of people, which came too. Some of them work at the embassy of China here in Berlin. We all had a funny afternoon together.
Later that day I talked with Anette. She told me I´ll probably have an exhibition in China next year ... and that the nice artist from China is really influential. Wow, I was kind of speechless.
So I´ll see what brings next year. But that would be so cool, because since my time in China last year it´s my wish to have an exhibition in there. Especially in Beijing.

But now I´m far to tired to think to much about it.

New Boudoir Queen

Manon G.
oil and egg tempera on canvas (linen)
100 x 50 cm

Eventually I´ve painted this new person. I´m not even sure, if it is a woman or a man - maybe a drag queen? Hmmmm. But it´s not really necessary to know the truth about her/him.

The colors in the original are more bright and of course the details are better to see. But that photo is only an impression, a glimpse over my shoulder.

At the moment I´m more in the garden than in front of my easel. It´s so sunny and hot, the roses burst into bloom, so I like to be outside.

Undercoat, base coat, primary coat?

Whatever the right translation is, today I´ve experimented a little bit. I´ve assembled some strecher frame and I had to ground it, of course. My Gesso is nearly empty, so it was a good way to try it.
Yesterday I´ve cooked some animal glue made from little and cute animals. Rabbits f.e. I´ve put it on the linen.  So today I´ve made the undercoat. I´ve found some old prescription. Normally it´s made with white lead, but ... ugh. The base was something similar to egg tempera. And that glue of cute animals. It has looked so yummy and creamy. I´ve used champagne-colored chalk and a little bit of titanium white pigment. Better than toxic lead.
I´m satisfied with the result. It looks good, not to blend white, even and without this little hills I always had with Gesso.