Overview of 2023

It has been a strange year. I haven't been very active creatively and that had various reasons. 

The year started out really bad with our beloved dog getting sick and in the end we had to let her go on the 13th of January. Exactly one month later I started working fulltime again, and while I really enjoyed my new job and colleagues, it left very little time for creative endeavours.

So I was actually pleasantly surprised to make an overview of this year and found that every month I did something creatively. Some months more than others, but still. What I didn't do, for the first time in 12 years, was make a calendar. And I still regret that. One of the things I really enjoy about Newyear is starting with a brandnew calendar. So I promised myself to make one next year. I will just have to make time for it. It's my new years' resolution ;-)

So, here's just a quick and not at all complete overview of some creative things I did this year. If you want to see more, have a look at my instagram.

January

I started the year really well with a 5-day "Happy New Year"-artchallenge in January, organized by Karen Abend from #Sketchbookrevival. This is one of those drawings. The prompt for this drawing was "house" and "fly" and "watercolor".

February

In February I started making collages again and incorporated the February Faces 
challenge in this. 

March

In March I experimented a lot with watercolour techniques and also made a few more rainbowladies.

April

Because I would be participating in an exhibition in May I painted a new canvas. This is the only painting on canvas that I finished this year. It measures 40x30cm (15,7x11,8") and I called it "the love that remains". I started a new one, much bigger, right away but it's still on my easel, unfinished.

May

In May I did a collage-workshop with one of my favorite collage-artists: Julie Liger-Belair. This is one of my experiments with collage. Great workshop it was!

June

Another one of my collage-experiments, inspired by Julie's workshop.

July

Aaand another one! For a while there I only did collage.... It is easy to work on when you only have little snippets of time.

August

While I was on holidays in Spain I tried out a few ideas in my journal.  This was inspired by a free lesson by Helen Wells, also organised by Karen Abend from Sketchbook Revival.

September

In September I was still experimenting with some new ideas. Here I tried a coloured doodle and used regular felt tip pens to colour it in. That was fun!

October

And then it was October and I really wanted to participate in Inktober again. But it needed to be something quick and easy. So I decided to make faces in ballpointpen on post-its, and accompany it by a quote for the day. Most of the quotes were pretty sad, as they were a reflection of the state of the world  ....

November

In November I finally discovered my artjournal again and I have been working in it on and off for the last few weeks. Who knows I might even finish it this year!

December

December: still working in my artjournal. If I manage to finish it, I'll make a video! Follow me on Instagram if you want to see it ;-)

And that's it for 2023! 

Thank you so much for following my journey. I hope the last few weeks of 2023 will be happy and I wish you all the best for 2024.

Take care, I'll be back ♥♥♥

 

Overview of my creative year 2022

One more day and this year is over. I'm not sure how I feel about it. It started promising, with covid finally relenting, but then in February the war in Ukraine started and the world was plunged in darkness once again.

It had a profound impact on me too. I started out the year with plans of finally painting on large canvases again, and when the war started it was as if all my plans evaporated and I couldn't find the motivation anymore to work on something big.

So when I started looking through my files to make an overview of my creative year, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I created more than I thought. So without further ado, here we go!

JANUARY

I started the year with a brandnew painting on canvas. It was so much fun to finally be painting big again. I worked all of January on this painting and finished it in February. Here's the finished painting. It's called "Is there anybody out there?" and measures 60x80cm. You can see details of it on my Instagram and on my website.

FEBRUARY

In February I started a new background on canvas right away and worked in my artjournal because I wanted to finish it this year (I didn't ....). Here's a collage I did:

MARCH

The war in Ukraine inspired me to get out my roadbook again and make mapfaces. I don't know why but whenever there's something going on in the world that deeply troubles me I tend to go back to my map paintings.  

I also started a "Celebrate women"-month, because of International Women's Day, and because I think it's important to keep fighting for equal rights for women everywhere. I made a whole series of drawings with a quote about women.

APRIL

In April I was preparing for an art market and an art exhibition in May. I painted some boxes, which was a really long time ago, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

MAY

Still working for my artmarket, I painted some small paintings on cut-out forms in MDF

JUNE

In June I was obsessed with making patterns. I want to do more with this, it's so much fun!

JULY

In July I started making backgrounds for my new calendar.

AUGUST

Working on my calendar-pages, and also re-working a painting from earlier years 

that I wasn't happy about:

SEPTEMBER

Yep, still working on my calendar-paintings, but getting there ;-)

OCTOBER

Putting the final touches to my calendar-pages and adding the quotes

NOVEMBER

I made a few new paintings on cutout MDF, inspired by Klimt and Hundertwasser. Glad to finally be doing something else than calendar-pages ....

DECEMBER

I participated in another artmarket and was busy preparing for that. And in the nick of time, right before the end of the year, I managed to make another journalpage in the journal that I had wanted to finish but didn't. Oh well, that'll be for next year I guess. Or whenever....

And that's it for this year! 

The only thing left to do is to wish all of you a happy, hopeful and joyful new year!

Take care of yourselves and your loved ones.

See you in 2023!

hugs, Denise ♥♥♥

2023 calendars are here!

I can't believe it's been almost a year since I was here last! I had planned on coming here more often this year, but somehow it didn't work out. The year started out so wonderfully with the pandemic almost over and freedom and travelling on the horizon. I felt like I could finally breathe again and live again, making all kinds of plans, and then booom, the war in Ukraine started and I felt myself and all my plans sinking away. 

But I did paint, and I did manage to finish my calendars for next year! So I thought I'd let you know :-) (if there's still someone reading this blog, I'm not sure ....)

Like I did last year, I made two calendars: one with (English) quotes, and one without quotes

The pictures I'm showing you here are all from the calendar with quotes.

I used the same paintings for both calendars

These are all paintings I made on canvasboard. I started out with backgrounds full of marks and paint, and then searched for figures in there.

I tried out some new ideas, where I combined intuitive painting with geometrical forms.

Different way of working but it was fun to do!

My calendars are for sale in my LULU-shop. When you order please make sure you use the correct link, either for the quotes-calendar or for the calendar without quotes.

Also, good news: from today through November 4th you get a 20% discount when you use the code SNEAKPEEK20 at checkout!

The calendars measure 11"x 17" (27,9 x 43,2cm) when open. The weeks start with Sunday. As you can see there's enough room for writing down your appointments and plans.

This is the direct link for the calendar with quotes

And this is the direct link for the calendar without quotes

You can also order them from the sidebar. If you have any questions at all, please contact me. You can do that simply by posting a comment or by e-mailing me at infoatdenthe.com. Please know that the sale of my calendars is in the hands of Lulu from start to finish. I don't even know who orders a calendar. So if there are any issues, you can contact Lulu directly, or you can contact me and I will contact Lulu for you.

Thank you so much for being here! 

Please stay safe! I'll talk to you soon ♥♥♥

#artcalendar #calendar 2023

Happy holidays and overview of the year 2021!

The last months have been so busy that I didn't get a chance anymore to post on my blog. So this post will be packed with pictures 😉 Like I do every year at the end of the year I review everything I've done artwise and that's often very satisfying because usually I've done more than I think I did so I can end the year feeling like I've taken some steps towards my goal of becoming a full-time artist 😊.

JANUARY

I started the year really relaxed by doing some art classes. This is from "Fearless faces", a mini-workshop by Jerney Marisha. Her classes are lots of fun and great value for what you pay.

FEBRUARY

In February I kept seeing these posts about the 100 day project, where you do something creative every single day for 100 days in a row and post about it. This intrigued me but I thought no way I'd be able to do that. But then I saw another artist who had the fabulous idea of making art in a little square each day. Because it's so small, it's easy to keep it quick, so I tried it and yes, it was do-able :-)

MARCH

In March I discovered one-line-drawings again, and combined them with watercolour and pastel. 

APRIL

In April I finally finished a project that I had started in December from last year: doodling the walls of  a bathroom in an organisation that has conference rooms and a restaurant. I was one of 6 artists chosen to do this, and it was great fun, but man, sooo much work! I don't even want to think about how many hours I spent there ... 

MAY

In May I ended my 100 day project. I managed to do some art every single day for 100 days in a row. I quickly stopped with the little squares, and instead I made a double spread per week, and every day I added something to that spread. It was way more fun that way 😃

JUNE

In June I was painting some women on a wooden form. I wanted to make these for my group exhibition in December, together with some mosaics. Different feel from working on canvas but lots of fun.

JULY

In July I had to start painting for my calendars. I made 12 backgrounds with inks and watercolours and coloured pencils and started looking for figures in there.

AUGUST

Still working on my paintings for my new calendars

SEPTEMBER

Getting my calendars ready for the printer, and working on finishing my mosaics. I also re-opened my Etsyshop, to sell my oneliner-calendar and digital downloads of work I did in my artjournals. I'm planning on adding more.

OCTOBER

Even though time was limited, I decided to once again participate in Inktober, this time with ballpoint-drawings. I really really enjoyed doing these sketches and adding some of the quotes that I wrote during the pandemic. It was healing.

NOVEMBER

I was participating in an online auction with five paintings and managed to sell all five of them! Two went to Germany, the other 3 found a home in the USA.

DECEMBER

I am participating in a group exhibition in Global Art Gallery, and I opened a new Redbubble-shop. I made some new greeting cards and Christmas cards and am planning on adding a lot more in the coming year. Redbubble might take the place of my Society6-shop. I like their style better, and they work with local printers, which is less the case with Society6. It won't make much difference for US-customers, but for European customers it really makes a difference, in shipping costs and customs and taxes. We'll see how it works out.

And that's it for the year 2021! The only thing left to do is end with some funnies 😀 Enjoy!

No matter what you're celebrating this time of year, I hope your days will be filled with love and warmth and joy and togetherness and above all peace! And for next year, let's hope:

Thanks for being here!

Stay safe, healthy and happy. I'll be back next year! 💕💕💕