I continued my exploration of inks and made some new drawings. This time I experimented with inks based on alcohol, oil and water, partly using raw pigments, but also spices and various powders.
It is very fascinating to see how the actually incompatible inks react with each other and how completely unforeseen shapes emerge.
When I painted, I didn't have any special motifs in mind, the pictures just "happened".
Everyone can see in them what they like.

At this time of year, Fitou is a little sleepy. On the one hand, that's nice, but on the other hand, a little action couldn't hurt.
And so we decided to organise a Christmas market in our art gallery. 
I asked some artist friends if they would be interested in taking part. They were :-)
We had beautiful ceramics, jewellery creations, Isabell painted beautiful Christmas cards and I tried out some new painting techniques for this occasion.

I once jokingly said I paint with everything I come across. That is indeed the case.
Experimenting with materials and combining them in an unusual way often results in unforeseen effects. I like to combine materials which are usually not used for painting, like to mix rough and fine ones and let them interact.

When traveling in China in 2019 I had the opportunity to get a very short introduction into Chinese calligraphy and traditionell Chinese painting at the Tang Bo Art Museum Xian. It was a rainy afternoon and the hotel receptionist recommended this museum as a must see to better understand Chinese art. We were the only visitors and the museum guide was happy to welcome two interested visitors. Our very detailed private tour ended in something like a classroom where we learned about ancient, traditionell and modern Chinese writing.

A beginning cold on the first cool weekend after the summer forced me to rest and so I did almost nothing but read and think. I was shocked how fast this year has already progressed, in the midst of all the work I hardly noticed that now summer is coming to an end.

After a long break, filled with plastering lots of walls with stucco and lime, I found some time painting again.
Deeply inspired by Chinese art, I started exploring ink drawing and calligraphy, watched many tutorials about it, went to the amazing exhibition of Fabienne Verdiers’ paintings in Aix en Provence and finally tried it myself.
I skipped my taloche and used new tools, techniques and materials.

Summertime in Fitou is always exiting, not only because of the fantastic weather and the Mediterranean but also of all the people and friends coming over. It’s an international bunch of people, very diverse and interesting. 
So many backgrounds and experiences resulting quite often in inspiring discussions about life, politics, economics, art, sports, eating, etc.

The command center, where everything else is getting energy and power from.

The kernel of a cell which contains most of the cell’s genetic material.

The central and brightest part of a comet.

The pieces that formed the center of a collection.

The important buildings which are the center of a city.

The center of all: the Nucleus.

During my trip to Vietnam at the end of last year I visited the exhibition in the Museum of Modern Art in Ho Chi Minh City.
That was somehow a weird mixture of old, classical, revolutionary painting and so called real socialism art. In the courtyard of the museum, many smaller galleries show traditional as well as modern paintings and sculptures. 

When creating the sunny house I became curious about using cement in my paintings. I quite liked the combination of glossy oil paint and raw cement and got in my mind to create a little series using such materials. Yellow will be followed by blue and red, always adding cement to it.
So, that’s the second painting: Rough.
The challenge lies in the application of such a rough material to canvas and thus I needed to explore how to mix different sorts of cement so it does not crack when dry.