A few photos

I now and then indulge in pseudo-artsy photography with my humble point-and-shoot camera. Some of the latest ones:

The aloes are in bloom at the moment; makes for an attractive sight in our otherwise rather monotone winters:

There are nevertheless signs of spring in the air. These peach blossoms reminded me of Van Gogh's famous painting of the same subject:

Around here, because of a rather high rate of crime, people tend to live behind high walls and ugly electric fences. Thus, the only way to take a nice photo is to tilt the camera up a bit:

Landscape with Quiver Trees

Had a desperate struggle with all manner of administrative crises, notably trying to get service out of a bank. Hopefully that is in the past now, so on with a bit of painting. Oil on board, 20 x 25 cm:

Quiver trees are found in some of the drier areas of southern Africa, and are actually a species of aloe. They are so named because indigenous people used their bark to make quivers for arrows.

Sunflower Field

Oil on board, 20 x 25 cm:

Cape Cottages

Fisherman's cottages, Western Cape. Pen and watercolor, 5 x 7 inches:

Flying Things

Studies of marabous:

And a helicopter:

Pen and watercolor on printer paper.

And a few more

Some more random sketches in ballpoint pen and watercolor, on printer paper:

A few random sketches

Some sketches in watercolor on printer paper (which works perfectly fine for watercolor sketching, if you don't mind a bit of warping and they don't have to last into geological time):

Loosely copied after an original by Pieter van der Westhuizen (1931 - 2008); I went straight into the watercolor without making any sort of preliminary sketch, so it's not exactly accurate. But it forced me to loosen up a bit, which was partly the point.

And a similarly loose copy after an oil by Maggie Laubser (1886 - 1973), whose work I admire:

Sketched from various reference photos; I first made the sketches in ballpoint pen and then filled them in with a few washes of color: