More photos of my exhibition in Petäjävesi Library, September 2015

Photo 1. Three techniques: colour pencils, acrylic colours and oil colours.

Photo 2. B&W drawings made with calligraphy felt-tip pens (1,2 and 3 mm). Upper work: The Old Church of Petäjävesi, an UNESCO Heritage target.

Photo 3. Calligraphy felt-tip pens with colour pencils.

Photo 4. Works with acrylic colours. The landscape on the right bases on a photo from the island of Karpathos, Greece, and shows the oldest building which I have ever visited!

Photo 5. Entrance of Petäjävesi Library.

Cheap framing, cheap exhibitions!

Framing of small drawings (and there are a lot of them on my shelves!) may be relatively expensive when asking the assistance of an art store. Framing prices of these kind of minor pieces of art may cost several tens of euros per drawing.

But there is an alternative! Indeed! All three frames of the drawings above have costed 4:50 € together! I give a hint! You must take cartonboard sheets, comparable with the original drawings, with you when visiting FLEA MARKETS! The prices of empty frames / frames with a printed picture or photo cost, ususally, only 0:50...2:00 €.

I am currently planning an minor exhibition of my drawings from 1996 to 2014 in one of four alternatives available. Three of the sites are all free, so I tend to prefer them. You are very welcome to visit the exhibition when the site and date are chosen!

- The photos included represent two techniques: charcoal (uppermost drawing of the old Petäjävesi Church, UNESCO target) and felt-tip calligraphy pens with colour pens (two drawings below: left a winter view to Lappeenranta Harbour, right a moment in a Slovenian cafe).

Suomenlinna, Finland, with two techniques.

I love Suomenlinna Fortress, situated on islands in front of Helsinki, Finland! Here are two versions, drawn on the very same place on the first island. Uppermost was drawn with ordinary pencil (I prefer HB), the lower with calligraphy felt-tip pens (I apply sizes from 1 to 3 mm). I had certain difficulties with the clouds in upper drawing - today I may draw them differently. I like to add some birds - thank you for the tip, Henrik Tikkanen!

Late spring on the shore of Ala-Kintaus Lake.

This is an example of those rapid drawings which I preferred to do some ten years ago. When travelling, one has not too much time to prepare his/her piece of art (if not taking a photo and continue afterwards with time).

The horizon is really over there: it is the opposite shore on the left side of the drawing. The shoreline of the cape and vegetation on the lake are NOT horizontally installed; they actually followed the reality. They have, therefore, some odd, confusing effect - but I still let them be like they are. Nature not always follows our orders....

Technique was simple: just drawing with calligraphy felt-tip pens and color pencils. I tried to express some feelings of Finnish spring (1.5.2006) when there were no leaves yet, water was icy and everything was waiting warmer days of early summer.

An old drawing - who knows this site?

I have started to invent my old drawings. Here is an example of calligraphy felt-tip pen technique.

Who knows this site? I will help: it is situated in Finland...

Rapid sketches of landscapes with fountain pen

A fountain pen is a nib pen that, unlike its predecessor the dip pen, contains an internal reservoir of water-based liquid ink. The pen draws ink from the reservoir through a feed to the nib and deposits it on paper via a combination of gravity and capillary action. (WIKIPEDIA)

 FIGURE 1. Lake Capern, Sweden, 2004.

FIGURE 2. Central London, England, 1998. 

FIGURE 3. Yorkshire, England, 1998. 

FIGURE 4. Juva, Finland, 1998.

These four sketches are examples of fountain pen drawings. I tend to carry this tool and a small (10.5 x 15 cm) sketch pad with me when travelling in Finland or foreign countries, either for duty or during vacations, since 1996.

This medium is very suitable in situations when the time limitations allow only rapid sketches (FIG. 1 and 2) as well as when focusing on the landscape or object without hurry (FIG. 3 and 4). No pencil is needed for sketching if the main horizontal and vertical lines can be found. Details will come later with ink, and no rubber is needed at all. This is the way I make sketches with permanent ink, either with fountain pen or calligraphy felt-tip pens.

I recommend all to try the fountain pen! It is easy to carry and contains usually ink enough for several sketches.

The only occasion when fountain pen caused me problems was when travelling back from my business trip to Shenzhen, China, some years ago. I have bought an inexpensive pen, filled with ink, and carried it in the pocket of my shirt. The left front side of my shirt was all black after the flight, obviously because the air pressure alterations and their effect on the soft (!) ink container of my pen...

Rapid drawing with calligraphy felt-tip pens

These two modest drawings, among other similar pieces of art, were done when sitting in a small town on the island of Karpathos, Greece, several years ago. Three widths of pens were available - 1 mm, 2 mm and 3 mm. I recommend these tools when rapid drawings should be done during a holiday (or even business) trip!

Island Santorini in October 2012

Island Santorini, Greece, was something very different: day-time temperature was +29oC all the week, in Finland below +10oC...

Travelling to Greece in October makes sense. Weather is still warm, streets not so over-filled by tourists and prices lower than during summer months ("low season" is just beginning, they say).

I had the honour to meet local, professional artist CHRISTOFOROS ASIMIS who has studied at the Fine Art School of Athens University and lived on Santorini since 1974. I really loved the blue shades of his paintings, presenting the views of local capital city FIRA and the famous small city IO, both situated on the top of the mountains. Mr. Asimis has also painted some fresco inside the big cathedral beneath.

My drawing above shows the view from FIRA towards IO on a sunny (like always) morning. I made it very fast because we were only sitting there to have glasses of local white wine. Tool: calligraphy felt-tip pen, 2 mm.

I can really recommend you to visit Santorini, Greece!

"Would you like to know a secret...?"

It is most fascinating to watch ladies, telling secrets to their best friends. These two girls were drawn with calligraphy felt-tip pens, some years ago, in Isola, Slovenia. Colours were added just yesterday. Without knowing any word of Slovenian language, I could understand that they were really telling big secrets to each other.

"Postcarding" continues....

Some new color pictures are under work. "Night shift" with pencils therefore continues.

"Postcarding"

Some models of my postcard drafts. First of them, a drawing of sleeping Aarne (Golden Retriever), is already printed with the aid of my friend. Techniques: color pencils and calligraphy felt-tip pens.

The Fisher Lady

I have to admit that my wife is a much more experienced fisherman than I myself. She is responsible for the fishing with the net - I only row the boat and take photos (and sit at the net...). This picture tells about a sad situation during mid-summer evening when very few fishes can be found - but, in opposite, late May and early June give us overwhelming big portions of pikes, breams, whitefishes and pike-perches.

This picture was based on a photo. First the main lines with a pencil, then with very thin (1 mm) calligraphy felt-tip pen and - at last - some shades with color pencils.

My drawing table

I will tell shortly about my working manners. I prefer to draw during night-time (whenever it is possible). Day-time is too confusing and I cannot reserve several hours' period for these tasks before midnight.

Drawing with the left hand is somehow challenging because the tendency to progress from left to right (as we western people tend to write). Sometimes it is better to start from the right side of the picture and progress to the left but - very often - I will forget it and need a rubber to clean "extra colors". Drawing gets even more difficult when I use ink-based tools (fountain pen, calligraphy felt-tip pens). Better to remember the working direction and - at least - let the ink on the left dry before the continuation of the drawing to the right. This is why also keep all the pens on the left side of the table.

Some additional tools are also needed: a coffeepot, a cup and a my old SELENA short-wave radio, which has served me in an excellent way during the years gone.

Isola, Slovenia

A warm summer day in 2007. The neighborhood of the hotel was hiding behind trees and bushes - everything green! This B&W picture was drawn by me just before the strong thunderstorm attacked the small city of Isola in the evening: lightning and rain vere really heavy!