Introducing a HD video clip showing the process of the 'Gouache Ruins' painting. The music gets louder at the end just to let you know. You can see the full resolution if you click over to my Vimeo link.
Enjoy!

'Gouache Ruins' Speed Painting from Erik Tiemens on Vimeo.

An invented Italian architectural (theatrical) sketch of ruins with a limited palette of gouache and watercolor. Fabriano 'Artistico' rough paper 5" x 9 1/2". There is some pen work that had bleed through the lighter gouache, almost separating into a bluish stain. I taped the painting session for a tutorial down the road.

Fall 2011 Workshop Coming Up!
I'm excited to announce a new painting workshop September 17-18, 2011. I will be teaching a Gouache and Watercolor class on the West Coast of California, at the Mendocino Art Center. Please sign up if you are interested. The location is superb for outdoor sketching and continuing the paintings in the large studio at the center. I will be painting multiple demos and assisting students with their thumbnails and sketch paintings.

For complete information click here: Exploring Gouache & Watercolor

The watercolor pictures here are from a recent East Coast trip. I had a chance to explore the coast of Maine and work on location. These are stills from HD video that was shot. I'm experimenting with possible tutorials this way.

A recent imaginative painting titled Autumn Storm. The medium is oil on panel, 9x12 inches with an egg tempera under painting. It could be a California landscape with hints of Dutch Italianate. Painters like Jan Both painted the transitional hilly spaces of travel with the often dry Roman Campagna setting in the distance. This at times can look similar to the vast pastoral valleys of California minus the classical ruins.

A small format oil on panel study inspired by the works of Jacob van Ruisdael, 1628-1682, supreme master of dutch landscape. In this case using cold press linseed oil as a medium and walnut oil as a brush cleaner, no turps for me!

Recent group of color & lighting studies for a fine art commission. 80 inches wide! Just got the linen canvas today from the John Annesley Company from Healdsburg, CA today. They create museum quality supports. Unbelievable quality.

100 posts later! Here are some playful capriccios with a Roman 1600's theme. Current personal project that I'm working on.

Detail of the digital painting, left side. I used Painter 11 in creating the image. Taking various Dutch, Italian Baroque themes and placing them in a 19th century landscape format.

Recent digital sketch painting, experimenting with gouache like drybrush and textures.

Oil study, linen on panel - 9x12 inches. Great cloud day several weeks ago near the Golden Gate bridge. This was painted on location with a small pochade box set-up.

Here are more shots and the Asilomar, Ca drawing.

Visited Pt. Lobos/Carmel area of California the past few days. What a wonderful spot to see the meeting of land and sea. I worked on a quick gouache sketch painting using Fabriano 'Artistico' cold pressed watercolor block paper (5"x7"). The paper had a strong coating of grey gouache from a previous painting-prep session, so this was nice to work on in the brighter sunlight. I painted thicker than usual and then finished with more watercolor touches and weak glazes. The Asilomar black and white sketch was created quickly using brush markers and a bit of pencil. I would like to take this further as a painting in the studio and work from these notes. I always suggest some kind of warm up thumbnail sketch to get a feel for the subject matter and potential framing before painting.

A small sketch on prepared hot press paper (300lb). Working on a dried wash of grayish paper bag brown, I put down a rapid under drawing with a dip pen and acrylic ink (burnt umber). Very simple palette of white gouache, sepia watercolor, blue gray gouache and black watercolor pigment. I took liberties with the location, not being topographically correct but getting the spirit of the location. Just as a note I used tube colors more than the half pans shown in the photo.

A few more sumi-e brush studies painted on rice paper. The tree study is based on a rapid pen sketch I made while walking on a coastal trail near Pacifica, California. The mountain study is more of calligraphic exercise from imagination. I'm curious to try other unique papers with ink and watercolor.

Recent experiments with sumi-e ink (水墨畫) Chinese & Japanese names (水墨画) brush drawing. Out of complete enthusiasm and ignorance I made up the brush characters in the sketch but enjoyed the process of seeing how you can't work back into the paper and make changes. It is all additive on the mulberry kozo paper (Shoji Gami). My daughter and I made some birds and flowers as well and added watercolor pigments for some color. I recommend that everyone try these materials.
The Asian Art museum in San Francisco has a wonderful collection of treasures including some contemporary sumi-e art work.

Wanted to share some rapid studies from my flat files. Experiments on blue gray and green gray toned paper. In addition the clouds above the water contain several types of opaque whites (Zinc & Chinese White - Titanium, different manufactures, materials, etc.

Venetian study - 3x4 1/4 inches - Gouache & Watercolor w/ dip pen & brush

Clouds over Water - 5x6 inches - Gouache & Watercolor w/ dip pen & brush

Happy New Year!!

Jumping back into it with a gouache and ink study from an oil sketch by Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes (Toulouse 1750 - Paris 1819). A remarkable painter and theoretician of Classical Landscapes. He was a major influence on creating the Prix-de-Rome du Paysage Historique... the big prize for landscape painters. Archille Michallon was one of his students and Corot being his student.

His Landscape with Ruins has a Roman setting. I think it's interesting to see nature take over the building forms and dissolve early architectural profiles.

Just to mix things up a bit I'm posting a recent oil on linen painting created this last August on the shores of Connecticut. The day I finished it, Hurricane Earl was roughly coming our way that night, but it ended with a sputter and nothing much. I had to rig an umbrella to my easel as it was starting to rain towards the end of the painting session.

The painting is currently for sale Susan Powell Fine Art - Gallery in Madison, CT.

I've been curious about paper making recently and over the weekend experimented with a hybrid linen cloth & 100% cotton rag watercolor paper blend to form a stronger than average handmade watercolor paper (Am I crazy?). I've contacted several specialized paper companies and wish to learn more about this historical process. Very labor intensive but rewarding to say the least.

On location nature study. Gouache on gray toned paper - 6x9 inches.