Cumulus humilis (Cu hum) - Maree

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

― Walt Stanchfield

W&N watercolour on Aqua 300gsm (Tarlton, Gauteng, South Africa)

While sketching this landscape, I was fascinated by the colour of the clouds. So as soon as I finished, I decided to research some clouds and came up with some interesting information.

Cumulus humilis (Cu hum) is the smallest non-ragged cloud and usually shows a light-grey shading underneath.

These are small fair-weather cumuliform clouds of limited convection that do not grow vertically and generally do not produce rain showers. Being at or near the beginning of the convective cloud’s daily life cycle, they lack the moderate vertical extent of cumulus mediocris. Consequently they are commonly classified as low clouds. Cumulus mediocris (Cu med) achieves moderate vertical development, has medium-grey shading underneath, and can produce scattered showers of light intensity.

Striking cloud colorations can be seen at many altitudes in the homosphere, which includes the troposphere, stratosphere, and mesophere. The first recorded colored cloud was seen by Nathan Ingleton in 1651, he wrote the event in his diary but the records were destroyed in 1666, in the Great Fire of London. The color of a cloud, as seen from Earth, tells much about what is going on inside the cloud.

Cloud droplets tend to scatter light efficiently, so that the intensity of the solar radiation decreases with depth into the gases. As a result, the cloud base can vary from a very light to very-dark-grey depending on the cloud’s thickness and how much light is being reflected or transmitted back to the observer. Thin clouds may look white or appear to have acquired the color of their environment (cloud iridescence).

Colors occur naturally in tropospheric clouds. Bluish-grey is the result of light scattering within the cloud. The bluish color is evidence that such scattering is being produced by rain-size droplets in the cloud. A cumulonimbus cloud that appears to have a greenish/bluish tint is a sign that it contains extremely high amounts of water; hail or rain.

Yellowish or brownish clouds may occur in the late spring through early fall months during forest fire season. The yellow color is due to the presence of pollutants in the smoke. Yellowish clouds, caused by the presence of nitrogen dioxide, are sometimes seen in urban areas with high air pollution levels. This info from Wiki

So, either our veldfire-season has started already or I’m living in a highly polluted area!

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Welcome shade

During our trip to Provence we stayed on several campsites in different areas, each of which was shaded by a variety of trees. On the banks of the river Ardeche we had Acacia trees overhead and I loved the patterns made by the overlapping leaves.

The lemon test- Concetta Flore

After listening to artist Stefano Faravelli talking about how the lemon created a link between Europe and Africa, the origins of its name, the colour yellow, and seeing his beautiful lemon study on black background, I also picked up his suggestion to paint a lemon as a test.

So, today I was outside with one of the last lemons from my tree.

What can I say: it's yellow- also. It reflects sunlight. It has innumerable pores that are influenced by light and create patterns. It's intense, solid. Full of nuances. It's just...difficult. It took me nearly two hours to do the job.

Rocks-Concetta Flore

Back from the small and natural Isola di Capraia, its volcanic origin given away by the dramatic shapes and colours of its rock formations, I'm sharing two of the four sketches I produced (others are published on my blog if you wish).
The Castle, partly collapsed centuries ago in the sea, is partly made of the rock it stands upon. The other formation, unfinished yet, tops one of the cliffs and it bears evidence of having once been under the sea.

Capraia is in Tuscany but actually much closer to Corsica (France). It's an idyllic place in spring, when migration brings on the island hundreds of birds that stop to rest and feed before leaving again. The village is inhabited by only 200 people in winter.
We gathered as a group of artists for an ex-tempore competition and were met by summery weather, crystal-clear waters and dolphins playing around our boat...

Golden-headed Quetzal (Pharomachrus auriceps)

Golden-headed Quetzal (Pharomachrus auriceps)

Gouache and watercolor on Moleskine.
(Study of color and shape for a larger  paint)
PD: Colombia is the country with the largest variety of birds in the world, with 1.889 bird species!

Exotic flowers

 

We've just returned from a fortnight in Tenerife where I had all the time in the world to sketch in my home made journal filled with pale shades of mi-tientes paper.  This fragrant flower was growing in the hotel gardens and I picked it after dark to smuggle to our room to draw over 3 days as the bud opened.  I used a pigment gel pen for the white parts of the petals.  I'd love to know the name of the plant if anyone knows it.

COLOMBIA

Do you know the name of this plant, please?

Angela Maria Russo - Angela Maria Russo -  Pianta tropicale a Cartagena de indias - acquerello su moleskine

Qualcuno sa dirmi il nome di questa pianta? E' un albero, l'ho dipinta in Colombia e si trovava di fronte al mare.

who knows the name of this plant? It is a tree. I painted it in Colombia and it was near the sea.

The place where I live - Maree

This little stream flowing through Tarlton (Gauteng, South Africa) near where I live provides me with hours of enjoyable sketching. It’s mostly dried up now, but with strong rains the water still flows, passing under the R24 and some telephone lines, meandering through Oaktree and Sterkfontein, ending up joining the Crocodile River in Muldersdrift on it’s way to Hartebeespoort Dam. 

This area is rich in sketching material as we border on the Cradle of Humankind, the Sterkfontein Caves and the Wonder Caves, with many game reserves, dams, lakes, rivers, airports and other tourist attractions. You can see a map of where I live and some of the attractions HERE and things to do HERE.

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Under A Telephone Pole - Maree

W&N watercolour and black ink sketch in a hand-made sketchbook with linen, satin-finish paper 

Here in the rural area where I live in Tarlton, Gauteng, South Africa, telephone poles are becoming a thing of the past. The copper wire has been stolen so many times that Telkom has abandoned the land-line system and resorted to a satellite telephone system. I’ll miss the poles and lines in the landscape, they provided great perches for birds of prey and congregating swallows before they leave on their great winter migration up North. 

I AM a copper wire slung in the air,

Slim against the sun I make not even a clear line of shadow

Night and day I keep singing—humming and thrumming:

It is love and war and money; it is the fighting and the

tears, the work and want,

Death and laughter of men and women passing through

me, carrier of your speech,

In the rain and the wet dripping, in the dawn and the

shine drying,

A copper wire.

- Carl Sandburg

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Botanical studies

During the past holiday weeks I decided to start working on some botanical sketches of leaves, just to start looking into the never-ending shades of greens and how to achieve them. I'm finding it very daunting yet fascinating. During the last year or so I started studying colours very thoroughly and in doing so I took out all the colours of my palette that didn't have the features I needed to achieve my goals. I ended up using a rather limited choice of favourite pigments which has been able to provide me with any colour I needed so far. I like keeping it simple to get the best and most varied mixes out of them. It worked, until I started mixing to match those greens... Any thought from the botanical artists reading this will be much appreciated.
http://matteogrilli.blogspot.com.au/

Azaleas

Winter is setting in here in northern Brittany and I'm not doing much sketching outdoors these days.  I've been looking back over the year and I see that this sketch from 11 months ago is good for now as these azaleas have just started to flower again.  We need a bit of colour to brighten up these wet days!

An Australian Spring Walk

You are very welcome to follow this link to read the full article.

Thank you.

Matteo

CYCLAMEN

Angela Maria Russo - Cyclamen - acquerello su taccuino Magnani

The sweet smelling cyclamen of the European woods does not adapt to an indoor situation. The cyclamen that brighten up our winters originally comes from the area that stretches from the Egean Sea to Persia (Iran).  From the Cyclamen, with its round, flat tuber similar to an onion, developed the numerous varieties of large flowered cyclamen (each flower being about three or four centimeters wide) that are used as flowering indoor plants in winter. The heart-shaped elegant leaves are streaked with silver as are the flowers that open at the end of a long, straight stem. These flowers may be cyclamen in colour but also different tones of red, pink or white. 

Pansies in the lawn

A few years ago a good friend gave me a pot of pansies when she came for lunch one day.  When they were over flowering I popped the plants in the garden to carryon growing.  Since then every summer I'm reminded of her when new little plants appear all over the lawn.  I usually rescue a clump now and then before the grass gets mown, even today at the end of September I have another little pot on the windowsill.  Thanks Julie for such a lovely lasting gift!

playing around- Concetta Flore

I'm trying not to be too perfectionist so I decided do go ahead with the shadows, though realizing there were fair chances that the ancient paper I was using (Fabriano 1947) would be too brittle for their softness (I was playing with the composition, mostly) and for tones in general... So it was, I'll start again on better paper.

The lime trees here are giving away their lovely seeds and I'd always wanted to paint them.

Rainbow Lorikeets

matteogrilli.blogspot.com.au

A beautiful tree, Concetta Flore

poplar, Tuscany, Italy

I painted this old and tall poplar on the river Albegna, in Tuscany, sitting on a rock and encircled by blue damselflies. The drawing took more than one session and I tried to catch the morning light.
Magnani paper, 20x50cm.

a sketch in Villa Borghese, Concetta Flore

A beautiful day, yesterday, in-between rainy days. So I took advantage of the sunshine and went a-sketching with husband and friends at the historic park of  Villa Borghese in my hometown, Rome.This is the "ancient"- XVIII cent. temple built on a small lake where people go rowing.

Butterflies

The caterpillar of an Orchard Swallowtail is a noisy chewer, on the early stages the larva resembles a bird dropping, it later changes into a camouflaged green. Who could ever tell that from a bird-dropping-looking tiny creature an amazing butterfly will later develop?

http://matteogrilli.blogspot.com.au/

Blue-faced Honeyeater

For more details on this beautiful bird please visit my blog