In Uppsala

Hi everyone,

It´s about time to post something again. Last week I was the busy little bee driving around half Sweden for different commissions but I took time to make at least one sketch.

This is from Uppsala again. 4 hours drive from my home town. Uppsala has an old scholar atmosphere and I love the colours of the older buildings. 17th century colour scheme was quite bright and bold with a lot of ochre, yellow, pink and indian red. Sometimes even a smoky blue nuance. Here a view from beneath the cathedral. A lot of students on bike pass by me and through the portal.

Colorful

Hi everyone,

Thank you for your nice comments. They keep me posting.

Last week I was out and about one evening and passed this old barn. The angle for the sketch is a bit boring since I was sitting in exactly in front of the building but the pond and the road limited my choise.

Having to do with the second best position for a drawing is very common, at least to me.

Have anyone of you experienced the same? I´m also a bit shy when it comes to sitting down in public and try not to

draw too much attention to myself.

Spring is sprung

It has been a long dark winter but finally spring is here and with it some extra energy to spend on sketching. Sorry for not posting for so long but for some reason this winter has been very uninspiring.....and as usually, dark. The sketch above I did a couple of weeks ago in Uppsala. In Uppsala you can find the oldest university in Sweden, founded in 1477. The whole town has an academic air to it. I draw a very wellknown view with the cathedral in the background.

New year-new possibilities

I´ve been absent from this blog this december. The main reason is that I´ve been occupied a moving out of my office and in to a new one. Exciting but a lot of work. The new year has started with very low temperatures. About -5 to -10 degreea C even in the middle of the day so outdooractivites are kept to a minimum. Yesterday I made a quick sketch from my livingroom tough.... eager to a least draw something, anything. I wish you all a happy new year. I´ll come back with the new view from my window.

I recieved an award from Kazumiwannabe for creating a cool blog! Im very proud to be chosen but I´ve been a lousy blogger lately. ( I´m supposed to send it forward to ten others, but I will have to come back on that one ).I´ve been busy making plans for my upcoming move to a new studio/workplace. It has also been a dark, cold and snowy period that drains all energy out of you. There isn´t much good to say about Sweden in november. You just have to get through it. So there has not been much sketching outside work. But I´m very pleased that there has been some exciting incoming work despite of the financial difficuties that we all go through. Today I´ll post an old sketch. Maybe you´ll seen it before but it was the best one to illustrate the colors outside my window. Have a nice day everyone!

November starts off well

Hi everyone,
The time of the year has come when the only way to sketch outdoor is from my car. Well, today it was sunny and nice but still the degree was around 0 C which is a bit chilly to sketch in. I got to park with a view though so I was pleased. The rest of the day I have been spending sketching on a childrens book. A new project of mine together with my sister.

Across the table

This is Therese. She is sitting opposite me, almost invisible behind her huge screen. I have lacked a little inspiration for sketching lately but I try to convince my self to step out of my comfort zone and just draw what I have in front of me. And so I did. Have a nice day everyone.

This is good

I found this site today....Josh Cochran such talent! Check it out!

A little something from this saturday

Lovely, lovely weather this weekend. Sunshine, not to windy and with crispy and clear air.

I had a photoshoot scheduled and afterwards I headed for Njuta and a nice cup of coffee. In between I sat down and made this. I have the town church behind me and the main street on the other side of the houses in front of me.
Almost all leaves have turned yellow or brown now. But here I managed to found some sort that still remains green.
I will try to keep up the sketching but with winter coming it will be harder to find great sketching moments. I hope you all have had a nice weekend!

Sunday

Hi everyone, had a pretty calm weekend. Coffee with friends, birthday party and a concert. It´s almost to cold now to do any outdoor sketching. I took some time sunday morning leaning against a fence and drew this little piece from Hjo ( my hometown ) It´s a part of the old quartiers with cobblestone and wooden housen almost climbing on top of each other along narrow streets. The bright yellow car at the left is one of the post office fleet. There were a bunch of them parked there but I decided that one was enough for this picture. Now I´m really starting to long for a sketching journey to Italy or Spain perhaps. The warmer temperatures, the nice landscape and architecture.... oh sweet dreams. Have a nice week everyone

Sis and Josefine

My 12-year old niece Josefine is watching TV and my sister is doing the same thing and knitting a scarf at the same time.

Sorry, sorry, sorry

for not being around on the blog lately. I´ve been working on this monster of a map and I´ve been exhausted when it comes to drawing. I´ve preferred doing other things at least to rest my poor hand. But now I´ve almost finished it so took the time to publish a small sketch of a base-player I did a week ago. It was during a break at a service and he was resting comfortably between songs. A small thing but I will be back with more. Just be a little patient.
Yesterday I visited a great watercolorexhibition by artist Johnny Alhgren. A lot of inspiration to continue with the watercolors. Today I´ve been at my sisters working on a new and secret project that we have started together. Let´s see what comes out of that. It´s strange how my creativity seems to increase during periods when I have to struggle with other things. Maybe it´s like a life saver. Sorry, now I´m starting to ramble. Have a nice time everyone and welcome back.

From Swedish theatre in Helsinki

The street in front of the beautiful Swedish Theatre in Helsinki. Our feet were aching severly after hours of walking through the town and finally we ended up here at the theater café.

On Queen street

I love september. These last couple of days the sun has been shining and I don´t intend to brag but the nordic light is fantastic. ( Maybe it´s a compensation for those winter months when there is none at all :-) )Today when I took a walk during my lunch hour everything seemed so crisp and clear and I wished I had brought my camera. But at least I managed to draw something, not anything special, just a little part from the city centre.

More from my trip

Thank you for your nice comments everyone. It´s make all the difference to know that someone apprieciate your stuff.
I was surprisingly productive during my trip to Finland and I still have some sketches to publish. The upper one is from the very centre of town were the big ferries from Sweden and Estonia anchor just in front of you. There are Viking lines red fleet and the blue one´s of Silja line. It´s pretty impressing. Most countrymen of mine come here with one of these on a the weekend or over-night cruise, staying just for a day. In the background a glimpse of the sea and the archipelago. Finland is the land of a thousand lakes and that is not an overexaggeration, rather the opposite.
Each evening we of course had to get a bite and we happened to end up at this italian place two nights in a row. Great food and a very nice athmosphere. And a great place to draw some of the other guests.
The lady with the cards is from the airport though. She and some other gals, I believe they were danish, spent the time before getting on a plane with a game of cards.
I´m already looking forward to next fall when we plan to go to Ireland. Please let me know if you have any other tip were else to go to draw.

The Helsinki Harbour

Late friday afternoon and time to go home. I will publish this one from Helsinki harbour before I close down the computor for today. It was warm and sunny when I sat there but I only drew a couple of the endless row of luxorious
yachts that laid there.
This week has been hopeless to plan due to some sudden new commission that is due next week. But I have hope for the weekend. Have a nice one everyone!

Along the boulevard, Helsinki

Hi everyone,

Now I´ve manage to complete another of my sketches from Helsinki. This one is made outside the oldest café in town. At least that is what the guide told us. It is called Ekberg and has a completely real retrostyle. Nice to see that some places are untouched by the different styles that pass by and have managed to keep their soul. They served a nice lunchbuffé with hot soup, delicious sandwishes on the excellent finnish dark bread and great coffee. They seem to have the same thing about coffee as us swedes, it can´t be too strong. I love sitting on a café chatting with a friend and just keep the pen going over the paper.

First drawings from Helsinki, Finland

Here comes the first studies from Helsinki, Finland. The upper one is from the big cathedral in the middle of town. Finland is a neighbour country to Sweden but it´s still obvious that there are a lot of differences in architecture and style. The influences from east are not strong, but still noticeable to us. The people of Helsinki was very nice and polite and it was a sothing experience to walk through a capital that was so calm and suprisingly quiet, even for us Swedes. A visit is highly recommended.

This trip was meant to be a handful of days of inspiration and sketching. I went with a couple of friends that also work with art and design and this combination was great. We strolled around, visited design shops and the home of famous architect Alvar Aalto. And we had plenty of time to sit down and draw. Luckily the weather was with us and we had some sunshine and really desent temperatures. Fall is really here now and the cold is nipping on your fingers every morning. I can really recommend this type of travelling, whith peers and people who have the same interest. I guess you have all experiences the same inpatient sighs over your never ending eagerness to sit down and draw.

During working hours

Life has been busy lately and though I´ve done some sketching I havn´t had any time to publish. Monday I returned from a trip to Helsingfors Finland. I´ve never been before even if it´s so close. Shame on me. It was fun though and I will publish a bunch of pictures later this week hopefully.
At the moment I´m on a project from town Mariestad and I was therefore I was there photographing some days ago. I stole little time and sat down drawing on the bank of river Tidan.
In the right of the picture is the residence of this regions governor. I especially like the bridge with it´s old lamp posts.

Läckö Castle

This is the castle I mentioned in a earlier post. It´s located on the end of cape Kålland in lake Vänern. The biggest lake in Sweden. This was the home of the wealthy count Magnus Gabriel de la Gardie and it has medieval origin before that. Today it´s a popular place to visit in summer. They have a summer opera and annual exhibitions. In the picture you see a part of it. It´s actually a watercolor and I´m very pleased that I find the medium somewhat fun again. It was my thing for a long time but eventually I got fed up and I felt I only did what was expected of me. So I turned to digital media instead or a combination of ink and digital. And my illustration commisions took me in new and exciting directions. Oh, here I found another one of the same place. I had a watercolor class here some years ago and it is a great place to practice painting shadows. Here you can actually form the shape of the castle by painting only the background.