Trees as landscape elements
Trees are important landscape elements. Especially close to or within residential areas trees can make a place look great even though the architecture is not so great.
Quite often I have drawn and sketched the trees near our neighbour village named Schmie. End of last year I visited same place at dusk again. These apple trees form a gate, an interesting visual accent. The structure of the trees breaks the rigid box form of the houses and turns an otherwise fairly boring view into a picturesque vista. I am always amazed how insensitive landowners and communties deal with trees that for some reason seem to grow at the wrong place. After cutting the trees a bare and naked place is left behind. Also our rural landscape gets poorer and poorer as old trees broken by spring storms are not replaced by new ones. Thus my drawing of trees often is melancholic in a way. The number of trees which only exist in my sketchbooks is growing slowly year by year.
How to draw a tree- Publication on Blurb
Forest diary- the sketchbook re-print on Blurb
Buy Print on Redbubble
on 22. March 2010
You are so right about the way trees are not taken care of, are butchered for the purpose of allowing a electrical or phone line and most disturbing, the every ready gardener that will trim the branches to make the tree into a lollypop shape. Your post is so important for everyone all over the world. Trees are wonderful and your sketches are expert.
on 26. March 2010
Thank you Pat for your passionate comment. Meantime I have learned to understand and accept that landscape is a process. But why do I ask myself again and again should we accept that the process is always to more exploitation and degradation.
Now that I am 50+ the memories of childhood start to haunt me. I remember times when swarms of butterflies were fluttering in front of me when I ran on dirt bumpy roads through the fields.
Now it is all concrete and no butterflies anymore.
on 9. April 2010
I missed this lovely sketch until now, Martin. It’s very effective the way you’ve used the wash to fill in up to the sky line and the old tree is terrific.
It makes me cry to see trees cut down. Our neighbour sacrificed an almond he said was ‘dead’ because he wanted to put in a spa pool. Now he is saying the other big almond is ‘sick’. It doesn’t look sick to me. It was covered with blossom this spring. Every time he mentions cutting it down I protest loudly in bad Italian.