Illustration Friday - Tales and Legends 2 - Man In Black

On the building of Old Town Hall complex, right next to a Gothic bay window, you can see a picture of the man in black who is mentioned in one of the oldest stories - about a widow and a false oath.

Every Wednesday , people used to come to the town hall court with their complaints to seek justice. Once a widow stated that her husband´s field had been robbed by one of the municipal lords who was sitting in the room. He replied that the woman is mad and pulled out a document with a seal which confirmed that the field was his. "The document can´t be right! " screamed the desperate widow. "Let the Municipal Lord swear that he is telling the truth ! " He did so, and added, " If it is a false oath, let me be punished justly." Then the whole house shook and became smoky, from the smoke appeared a devil, he threw the liar over his shoulder, and before he disappeared with his booty touched the Town Hall wall with his black hand, and left for ever pressed into it picture of the lying Municipal Lord. Or his own , who knows it exactly today?
And here it is Devil/man in black , done in watercolor and Lamy ink pen on WN CotmanNOT/cold pressed 300 gsm watercolor paper

Illustration Friday - Tales and Legends 1 - Joker Posmievačik

There is only a few cities in the world which has so many tales and legends still living among people, like Bratislava. Many of these found their artistic realisation in fountains, pictures or statues.
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In the niche of Neoclassical house (on Panská street 29) is a small mid-nineteenth century statue of a crouching boy laughing malevolently to which has stuck the nickname Posmievačik (Joker)
The Joker is linked with a story about a beautiful girl living in Pressburg (former name of Bratislava) who could not decide between two admirers. As a result of her quandary, she said that she would marry the suitor who could build a house more rapidly. (Clever girl , isn´t true ?) Both masters started to build houses on sites standing opposite each other. The winner got the bride. In a niche on the front of his house the Joker sat to mock his neighbour for his loss. However,some city inhabitants say that the statue is only boy who wanted to see a coronation procession, so much, that he peered over from his potty where he was sitting. Others say that the boy is looking at flood waters to see if they have started to fall. Finallu, according to some, he is showing sailors the way to the previous location of the red-light district - the Vydrica.
Who knows it today ? It´s a tales and legends all about.

The Joker is done with watercolors (Yarka White Nights) and Lamy pen at WN Water Colour 300 gsm Cotman NOT/cold pressed paper

17th World Wide Sketch Crawl / Bratislava, Slovakia

Today was a day for 17th WWSC. Here in Bratislava was terrible weather, it was foggy, rainy and windy. Despite of this I spent two and half hour in Old Town sketching down some maybe interesting objects.In my art goals for 2008 standing : depicting of 12 views of Bratislava here in my blog. There are a plenty of interesting buildings, statues, fountains here . On sketches you can see Ganymede´s fountain right at front of the Slovak National Theatre building, funny statue of Papparazzo and brave soldier (all are friends of Čumil and Schoene Naci ) , with short break for hot tea with view to a Old Town Hall with Roland and his fountain,now covered for winter time).Drawings are done in normal HB pencil and watercolor pencils , sorry for weak scans .

Illustration Friday - Stitch

Done in watercolor pencils Koh-I-Noor Mondeluz on Tillia watercolor paper 250 g

...gone

This is how I feel last 3 months...completely burnt out.

Happy New Year

To each of you, each member of EDM group and each visitor of my blog , thank you for your supportive comments and permanent inspiration.

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Let your year 2008 be CREATIVE & HAPPY !

BIB 2007

Each two years in early autumn time I am looking forward to most prestigious contest in the children's illustrations' world which is held here, in Bratislava, Slovakia. The title of this contest is “Biennial of Illustrations Bratislava”, with the official abbreviation “BIB” and the particular year added.
The Biennial of Illustration Bratislava (BIB) is an international juried exhibition of originals of illustrations made for children's and juvenile books. The BIB International Jury awards the following prestigious awards: GRAND PRIX BIB, BIB GOLDEN APPLES, BIB PLAQUES, and a HONORARY MENTION TO A PUBLISHING HOUSE. An award of the Biennial's highest award gives an artist the right and opportunity to mount an individual exhibition of his/her own book-illustration works at the next year of the BIB. During particular BIB years, winners of H. C. Andersen Award and NOMA CONCOURS Award (the UNESCO Asian Center in Tokyo, Japan) holders have a separate group exhibition in Bratislava. And it is feast for eyes not only for children.

The winner of the Grand Prix in this year´s BIB 2007 is Einar Turkowski from Germany :

You can find the works of the other winners here.

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Ticket to exhibition looks like this - with illustration of Slovak artist Jana Kiselová-Siteková :

The Ministry of Culture of the Slovak Republic, Slovak Commission for UNESCO, and BIBIANA, International House of Art for Children are the principal organizers of the contest.
The participation of artists in the BIB is provided for through and administered by national IBBY (International Board on Books for Young People) Sections in individual countries. Only in the event that no national IBBY Section works in the country where an artist lives/works, those interested may file their applications with publishing houses, artists’ associations etc. and ask for their cooperation. As well, independent individual applications may be submitted in such cases, too.
The next BIB 2009 this GrandPrix will be yours , maybe .

Autumn haiku - Congrats to Elizabeth

Today's is Elizabeth Perry's 1000th consequtive posting of sketches and drawings over at her blog Woolgathering and as part of her online celebration, I am posting my autumn haiku. Congratulations Elizabeth and we are looking for the next 1000 !

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autumn wind
colourfull leaves gently
sweeping through garden

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Coming down with flu

Rocks and gravel - Zen garden

An exercise in rock and gravel textures for Kate's online class. I must say it was a great fun.


17 x 24 cm, watercolors on Rubens 220g paper

EDM #135: Draw a salad (Shopska salata)

This drawings is in my sketchbook from last summer holiday in Bulgaria .
Cuisine of Bulgaria is a special subject. Because of its geographical position and long history Bulgarian cuisine is a mixture between the best parts of the Slavonic, Greek and Turkish cuisines. This country is one of the world leaders in number of long-livers. And the reason of such high life interval is first of all a healthy food. Bulgarian cuisine is quite heavily centred on salads, which are varied and tasty.In every restaurant in Bulgaria the first thing you will notice on the salad menu is Shopska salad which is Bulgaria’s most famous salad. It is named after the Shoppi, or natives of Sofia (the capital of Bulgaria). This salad is perfect in the summertime, when all the ingredients are freshly picked from the garden, but it is tasty and easy to make the whole year-round. It was my favourite meal during hot day.

Shopska salata is nothing more than diced tomatoes, cucumber and grated cheese (rather like Greekfeta) . Bulgarians have their own white cheese, Sirene . Sometimes is added baked and peeled pepper and onion,too. Salt, vinegar, oil to taste . Top with black olive. Enjoy !

Drawings is done in watercolor and inkpen in my sketchbook

Schoener Náci

You already know there are several goofy statues here in Bratislava , each of them has their unique story. Not far (maybe 40 steps) from Čumil you can pass by the another statue . It is well known Schoener Naci (here is the photo with my daughter).The Schoener Naci was a man who lived in Bratislava in the early 20th century, when Bratislava was called Pressburg. He was a poor, polite and always smartly dressed ( in worn out tail-coat, polished shoes , a top hat and noble white glows ) man who wandered around the Old Town during the day.They said to have become mad as a result of an unhappy love and therefore he daily for almost four decades walked the city with stick in one hand and a donated packet from some coffee and cake room in the other hand (It was rather effective advertisement!) He was ready to help everyone who asked and he was gallant to women he met on his route..."Kiss your hands" was his greatings to nice woman ! His real name was Ignac Lamar. "Naci" is the nickname for Ignac and "Schoene(r)" is the German word for "handsome".
It is not coincidence I mention it , because his remnants coming back after 40 years to Bratislava on last Sunday, where there was several hundreds people saying good bye to him !

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The statue itself is work of sculptor Juraj Meliš and was several times badly damaged by English "stag" parties. Drawings is done with Lamy pen and watercolor pencils

Coronation ceremony

Bratislava became a coronation city of Hungarian kings in times when Hungary lost its Coronation status due war with Turks. Old Bratislava became a meeting point of kingdoms, seats of kings and archbishops. In the St. Martin Cathedral in the years 1563 – 1830 10 kings, one ruling queen, and eight kings’ wives were crowned. The only ruling queen crowned was Maria Teresa from house of Habsburgs, she was crowned on the 25^th September 1563. The last coronation which took place in the city was on the September 1830 and it was Ferdinand V.

Nowadays traditions of coronations in Bratislava comes to life every year in the first weekend of September. Celebration processions through the streets but also night tournaments, puppet theatre shows, belly dancers and fire eaters offer an opportunity for fun in the streets of the old town. It is one of the biggest cultural events in Slovakia and helps to understand the historical coronation ceremony of Hungarian kings. According to historical documents in the Cathedral of St. Martin the ceremony of coronation itself is displayed written, during which the king is baptized and receives a coronation insignias: St Stephens Crown, sword, robe an apple and the staff. Then in the streets of the town the next parts of the ceremony take place: the knights of the golden spurs are knighted, an oath is given to the country, and the king rides up the coronation hill where he blesses all major compass points. In the framework of the coronation ceremony the representative of other king towns come to greet the king, workshops present their crafts, instead of water there is wine in the fountain, knights tournaments take place and a folk banquet takes place where there is offered roasted bull.

Today started 5th Coronation Ceremony of the Hungarian Queen Anna Tirol, wife of King Matthew II., crowned on the 25th of March 1613 in Bratislava. Despite of bad wheather it was spectacular performance. Ceremony was for the first time on main square , for the first time in Latin language and it last more than 1 hour !

King´s route from St.Martin Cathedral through the old town is marked .

Drawings done in daily sketchbook with Lamy pen and portable WN Cotman watercolor

Thailand seascape

Today is a grey, rainy day here and my thoughts are rovering along the beaches of sunny and hot Thailand. You are looking on my last week´s homework from Cathy´s class about creating textures in watercolor (btw. her book is really awesome !) .Here you can see scraping with toothpick, scratching with sharp blade knife, splattering with water and with paint, and salt , too. This last one is not too much to see, because it was a fine sea salt- you can see results on right side between sea water and sand . It is not easy depict water texture .

Kate´s class - Foliage

This picture is an last week exercise for class of Cathy Johnson .I don´t know , I still have tendency add some pen drawings there.

EDM #131: Draw a spray bottle

Done in Lamy Safari pen with Caran d´Ache Blue Night ink and sepia watercolor in daily sketchbook (not watercolor paper )

Two castles

I am taking wonderful watercolor class (of wonderful Cathy Johnson , why not you ? ) and for this ocassion here is coming time for better watercolors for me. On eBay I was succesful bidder for Winsor Newton watercolor Sketcher´s Pocket Box ( inside with 12 halfpanes of Cotman WC and neat retractable brush). It is so small I can take it really everywhere with me. So this sketch I made in my daily sketchbook from city beach on bank of river Dunaj. It was really quick and with this small pocket you are not a center of view for people all around.Of course, first I need to know these colors, but I am very satisfied with it.
Bratislava´s castle is done in Lamy pen and WN watercolors in my (no branding) sketchbook Here is another castle, this is castle hill in Alanya (Turkey) taken from Cleopatra beach, sketch from last holiday . Besides some scanner troubles ( no blue sea or sky) you can see that for example green is quite different from WinsonNewton . This sketch was done in Koh-I-Noor watercolor and Lamy pen.

Happy months

It is a long ago I last updated my blog. Even not updating, I still create, draw, paint or make a photo each day.Only this posting.... :-( Let´s say I take a blog holiday.
But these months was so exciting that some of the events must be mentioned.

For example gigantic monstrousus concert of the rock legend, music band GENESIS. This group started 40 years ago and now, after 15 still years, they are on stage again. Present new world tour „Turn It On Again“ are going through twelve European countries (starts from Helsinki to Rome) and I think from September people from USA and Canada can enjoy their music.
The concert in Prague was performed on Sazka ARENA 20th June 2007. Tony Banks, Phil Collins , Mike Rutherford, Chester Thompson and Daryl Steurmer was perfect on gigantic stage in front of 25 000 people standing here . The drawings I did are drawings as seen from two megascreens , I was standing maybe 70 meters far from stage.The colors are finished later at home.








During these two months I became happy winner !!! Normally I have no luck but this is so special I named it "East meets West" right here , in Bratislava. On the photo you can see two small parcels, one from free Moleskinerie giveaway (contains lovely ruled notebook Moleskine ), second one right from fabulous printmaker David Bull (contains small print "Fuji from Edo Castle" ). Both of these sites are definitelly worth of seeing and bookmarking !!



And holiday, of course. This year in Alanya,Turkey again. I made small travel sketchbook , for this moment I will publish only two pages , the rest next time.