buy this postcard on Zazzle – Abbey Maulbronn

This postcard in ink and oil color sent beginning of September  apparently was not received as it was not published on “Postcard from my walk“. What went wrong I do not know. But it is always good to have a scan.

After reading some of the essays in the book “Exploring new information cultures”(link to the book on amazon, no I get no commission) I am not sure whether this is an entirely off topic post. Reading is not only reading text it is also reading pictures: reading becomes looking. The new media+internet seem to blur the distinction between reading and looking and also writing.

The book is published under CC3.0 license and there is an online version at www.IreadwereIam.com
I prefer the printed version because it is easier to read. The typography in the online version is not very suitable for online reading. The printed version is much more friendly for the human eye and easy and quick to read. The printed version has a table of content,glossary, a keyword index and a table of content showing the first 140 characters of each essay.

The 82 essays are short, 2-3 minute texts, which propose very inspiring and unique views on reading in theory and practise. Some of the essays of course touch the well-known subject of deep reading loss and keyword skimming trained by reading online versus the traditional reading of books, but that is only a side line. The book opens a can of inspiring worms. It is worthwhile to digest not only the texts but also to connect via internet, to search authors and their institutions and their websites for deeper reading and discovery.

One connection leads to the institute of network cultures to the unbound book and the video below.

The local bookstore has proven indispensable one more time. I found one copy of “Oak,one tree,three years,50 paintings” by the British painter Stephen Taylor lying on top of a pile of art books as if it was left there with purpose to be found by the right buyer. A quick look made clear that I had to have the book in any case. At home I slowly realised that I had made a really lucky discovery.

Painting is dead since Duchamp (Gerhard Richter). If painting is dead, plein air and/or landscape painting is deader than dead. But it is something painters cannot let go it seems. I can spare you explanations about the artist Stephen Taylor and his motivations (Stephen Taylor writings) because the artist has documented his work on his website. After seven years of studies in the same open Essex landscape Stephen Tayler has turned his attention to painting water. His almost scientific interest in the perception of colour and light becomes more clear after watching the short videos on painting water.

It is the first time that I see a painter making use of digital photography and plein air field studies with convincing results. The big paintings are photorealistic in an irritating way as they contain a breeze of Rousseau at the same time which makes the image toggle between photography and painting. The book has a some interesting detail reproductions which illustrate indeed the intention of the painter to display the perception of nature with his observation-based painting. The “pictures of a tree” seem the inevitable by-product of that process.

For someone who has done observation-based sketching in the woods for a couple of years Stephen Taylor and his work are a great confirmation. After the forest diary I feel that I need to take the next step with drawing,sketching or painting trees without making “pictures”. That was the mantra I had in mind over the last 12 months when I set out to the next sketch : make notes of what you see, sketch without making a picture. Reading this book might be the required catalyst.

Today I want to point out to artist Mara Korkola and her small winter landscapes. The format is modest, but somehow the views she paints seem bigger. The presentation in triptych might give to that effect, but does not explain it in full. I like the clarity and stillness in these images which I have seen so often in nature.  I look forward to the cold season with its very own beauty.

Buy this sketch as postcard on Zazzle

At the end of October and beginning of November the colors of autumn seem to peak in our forest and gardens here. I was on the way into the woods but decided to stay on a meadow with some fruit trees and an old garden shack near the forest edge.

I am experimenting with primed paper in one of my sketchbooks. This gouache sketch was “hard work” as I had painted the paper first with some abstract acrylic colour pattern which then was covered with a layer of white wall paint. The wall paint is hydrophobic to some extent. Some spots on the sketch need hours to dry. I had to apply a bit of gouache color, that floated a lot on the surface of the paper. The next time I will sand the wall paint layer to see whether gouache colors will connect easier then.

Home sweet home via Refined Waste

I was amused by a recent blogpost about the ING Art Collection. Somehow I did not get no further clue what the connection between banks and artists is other than what I knew already but wasn’t said in the post : The artists want the money and the banks want public relation.

What I understood was that the blogpost functions as public relation for the bank and that for some reason the parallels between banking and art or art market were not touched at all: for example highly speculative profits, non transparent price and profit manipulation.

Today I found another piece of evidence why artists should not stay away from banks and their lucrative sphere of influence. Perhaps I should burn a drawing of Deutsche Bank and auction it on Ebay? I certainly could ship that domestic!

If that is not enough you can read what the NYT says about the correlation between art and banking

Forest Diary by Martin Stankewitz | Make Your Own Book

The re-print of the entire forest diary sketchbook is now available as color paperback in the Blurb bookstore. The book preview shows the all 158 pages. The size of the book is 6X9 inches, it has more than 100 images,the book weight is 275 grams. 61 gouache sketches, done on site between January 2009 and October 2011 in the forests of Maulbronn,Germany, are re-printed on double pages. As the original sketchbook covers on front and back are re-printed too to book contains a mini version of the original sketchbook.

Apart from the images there is an introduction and notes on sketching gear. Seven image series that show sketches in intermediate state illustrate the sketching process. The book is for people who are interested in sketching and painting outdoors and nature diaries. Collectors of sketchbook art might be interested in the re-print of this sketchbook project dedicated to the forests.

At the seam, in the middle of the double pages, the layout was adjusted to compensate the loss that occurs by printing/binding in the middle of the book. This is visible in the online book preview,but will not show in the printed book.

I made some adjustments based on the proof print I had received recently from Blurb. The colour print in paperback is a new option for Blurb customers. The colored pages are printed “semi matte” on white coated paper, which is quite similar to the appearance of the original sketchbook paper. The image quality is remarkable, a real 4-colour picture print. From my point of view coloured paperback books are a great addition to Blurb books and worthwhile to check out.

Kellerklub from flori kurzum on Vimeo.

Kurzum is the greatest up and coming cross fusion acid trash metal gig or anything similar giantic.

Taking a short tour around the Abbey Maulbronn takes not much more than an hour with plenty of time to sketch and take photographs. Spring, Autumn and Winter are the best seasons as to light and colors for a visit to Maulbronn. The view on the quiet lake is beautiful at around 17.30 -18.00 h in the evening these days when the sun lights the trees in autumn colors. I did some quick sketches with ink on paper sheets I had cut from old monotype prints.

autumn leaves at the lake by editionha
Browse other Autumn Posters

Recently Blurb announced their Ebook feature on their weblog.

Of course I had to try out immediately and tested my publication “How to draw a tree”. As per today the Blurb ebooks should be opened only with the free IBook application for Iphone and Ipad. Other readers like Stanza might not work. Also the email program of my Iphone crashed several times as I had send the book file via email to get it on the phone.

You better download Blurb Ebooks and move them into Itunes or download the file from the url that comes with the buying confirmation directly to your iphone or Ipad. Downloading an ebook to read it on the Iphone is pretty much useless, the screen is much to small. For the Ipad or PC,Mac these Ebooks make perfect sense.

My next publication a re-print of the forest diary is in the works, in fact I am waiting for my hard copy for final proof check. I did it as a colour pocket book in size 6×9 inches (15×23 centimeters). This is the cheapest printed colour version that Blurb offers at present. Nevertheless the hardcopy with 158 pages will cost around $25 plus shipping. The ebook version can be as low in price as $ 5-6 per copy even though Apple will take 30% of the profits.

The difference in price for black and white small paper backs and the ebook version is “marginal”. The 30% share that Apple takes and taxes that are deducted in case of shipments to foreign countries are the reason for that. For a German Buyer 30% go to Apple and 7% to German taxes, in total 37% of the book price are deducted. As a result authors have to charge a ca. 40% higher markup to get similar result as with hardcopy print.

However as I understand Blurb does not feature ebooks in the Apple store yet. That will come soon. I assume that this is the reason one has to accept the Apple store TOS before you can sell an Ebook in the Blurb store. As with the hardcover versions you have to buy your own book also as ebook before you can sell online. In other words publishing an ebook with Blurb costs you $1.99 as per today.

Unfortunately it seems that images files can be extracted from the Epub document format that Blurb is using fairly easy. Some photographers have voiced concerns about this, they fear that their work can be taken away in original resolution from the present book files. I commend to check for the discussion going on in the Blurb forum.

There is another technical issue that applies to books with double page image spreads. Blurb offers a double spread image layout in the book making software. However the trim in the book middle is not compensated. Therefore the image center is “damaged” or cropped in printed copies if one uses this option. The Ebook looks exactly like the book preview and that shows not that effect. As printed version and Ebook version are derived from the same book file data you will either have a mutilated print version or a not so professional looking EBook version if you compensate the trim in the middle of the book by placing your images in way that compensates the cut.

As with printed books Blurb seems to offer with their ebook option a way with very low barrier for authors. I would bet that many author artists will be attracted by the option to publish and sell in the Apple store.