3000 likes - give away time :-)

Unbelieveable! More than 3000 people like Red Cheels Factory on Facebook!
Time for a little party. Time for a give - away:

You can win a party postcard set; including 5 Red Cheeks Factory party postcards:

How can you win this set?

Simple! Go to my facebookpage and give a comment on my facebookpost
Then I know, you are in for this party. I will pick the winner on Tuesday, the 1st of July
Good luck!

Gallery Oker online auction

Remember the exhibition 'Like' in Gallery Oker?

The exhibition is still going on, but I have some exiting news to share:

There will be an online auction, You can make a bid on some of the works.
That work will go to the highest bidder. And what makes it even more unique.
I offer two original works.

Aboves painting is titled: 'ín de gloria',  mixed media on paper, 50 x 50 cm.
This is an unique work! There's only one available in the whiole world.

If you are interested, you can make a bid on the works on the online auction here.

Below  'drie koningen' ('three kings'), mixed media on paper. 25 x 32 cm.

The online auction offers 8 works in total:

Besides my works, also nice Art Prints of Kordula Röckenhaus and Helen van Vliet and two original illustrations of Jacqueline van Leeuwenstein.

So if you like to purchase  a real 'Nelleke Verhoeff', go to the online auction and make a bid. Good luck! The auction will last from now till the 6th of July!

Make Monotypes 2

I'm a bit behind with blogging about the Make Monotypes class, which I wrote before. Below one of the prints I made last week: 'wooden shoes', a combination of Monotype and Photoshop.

I'm experimenting a lot and most of the results are not for the viewers eye. 
A whole pile of experiments and lots of learning.

In week 2 we had to look for found object, things from nature, threads, feathers, etc. I like these objects much when they are inkted. I think I like them more than the prints I make ;-)

Second assignment was to make our own stencils and play with them. I liked the thread with it's curls and was inspired to make the print below: the parade. I make other things from what I normal make and I love the textures of this technique.

At the end of the week we made some two color prints with your own stencils. I have the feeling I can work on these more, they are only a beginning of something. I'm not that happy with the colors, mixing them is yet another thing...

The next week was about making your own stamps, first with found stamps. Now I almost can't throw anything away anymore. You can use so many things to make textures. My home is a mess and I need to find space where I can put all these props.

Again I made many prints. I played with abstract figures, a mixture of yoga and acrobatics. I liked the experiment wit negative and positive space. The most easy was to use one color.

There's a learning point to balance my shapes, while using more colors, in a way they will work well  together and interact, without distracting each other.

These prints are sa bit simple. I have the feeling I could do more with it, but at the moment this is where I am. I love the lines you'll get after lifting your stencil of cardboard and make a print of what's left on your plate: the detail print.

And ofcourse I couldn't resist to make a face. The collar of the lady I made with an orange juice press. .(don't know if this is the right english word, but it gives a nice effect)

And for those who are interested:  here is an example of the wooden shoes print you see at top of this post. Before and after I edit it in Photoshop. Before it's nothing, but after playing and experimenting on the computer, I make a whole new image. But I hadn't been able to make this without the basic print. I feel a bit like a magician this way. I surprise myself ;-)

We are halfway the course now. I'm curious what I will make the coming weeks.
Will be continued...

go with the flow

It has been a while since I posted something here. I'm busy with all kind off things and I don't take the time to blog about it. But today I do.! I want to show you my nautical wall art piece I made for Bootcamp, inspired by the drawings I made earlier.

The assignment was to make Wall Art. This is the market I'm most familiar with. So I was quite happy.And the nautical theme is very inspiring. 

It is already available in my Etsy shop. Brand new and fresh, waiting for a new owner ;-)

some nautical illustrations

For Bootcamp we have a new suject for the June month. Drawing nautical things. It's a very inspiring theme, There are so many possibilities: the sea, ships, boats, sea- animals, mermaids, sailors, waves... I love it! It triggers my imagination. :-)

I made these singing mermaid twins.

You can find them singing in my etsy shop to brighten up your wall :-)

But I made more drawings this week!
I also made this sailor man, John, with his the loooong beard, secretly wanting to be a mermaid...

And Otto Octopus. I can't help it, but when I think of sea animals, I have to think of dancing creatures, maybe it's because of the waves of the sea...

And here's another sailorman, named Sven, with his huuuuuuge moustache, dreaming of being a captain of a huuuuge ship once....

Tomorrow we will get the next assignment based on this nautical theme. I'm very curious!
Will be continued

Make Monotypes 1

This is the first week of the Make Monotypes class with Linda Germain. Till now I like it very much. It brings nice surprises. Here is my latest experiment: 'hello, dear moon'.

The first day we had to make a gel plate with glycerine and gelatine. Products I only know by name, but have never worked with. It was quite an experiment to make it. At first I thought: maybe I can skip that part of the lesson, but now I know it's an essential part of the course.

The second day we were asked to gather all kind of 'stamp' materials. With textures on it like stripes,  bubbles, smooth and rough surfaces etc. And make shapes. To keep it simple we only chose one shape. I chose the half circle and made many (way to much ;-)) shapes.

The third day we did  a warm up exercise. During about 20 minutes you follow Linda's  voice on the video and print along. It's fun, but also hard work. I had big red cheeks during the process :-)

It's an exercise to learn  and understand the terms and principles of this gel plate monotype printing. Without thinking to much or judging yourself.

You get two versions of one lay out. First you ink the plate, put some stamps on it and make a 'shape impression'  After that you remove the stamps and print a detail impression. Here is one example of the prints I made:

Now I understand why you need a gel plate. You give pressure on the paper, so that the gel plate moves along under your hands, because it's flexible. So you can see ALL the textures of the stamps in detail. Really fascinating!

The two versions are totally different from each other. It needs much more practice to understand what's happening exactly, but that's one of the reasons why I took this class.

I scanned the detailed impression and edit it in Photopshop. These creatures appeared:

Here's another experiment. It's from a one color monoprint which I played with in Photoshop. I posted it on Facebook and a few people thought it was the Pope! "Bedankt fur die Blüme",  he always says with Easter in Dutch. So here's the Pope amongst his flowers :)

This was only a part of the first week. I'm looking forward to learn much more!
Will be continued!

Red Cheeks Factory on Pinterest

Hooray, hooray! Today I finally registered on Pinterest!

I doubted for a long time, because I know it can be quite addictive. But today I gave in. And it's fun! Yes, also addictive, but that will be a challenge to deal with. Click here if you want to follow me. You are welcome :-)

inspiration: Hendrik Nicolaas Werkman

Here's some work of Hendrik Nicolaas Werkman. He was an inspiring artist living from 1882 - 1945. He experimented a lot with typefaces and printers' materials, such as stenciling and stamping. I love it. He can tell a lot with just simple shapes. But why am I blogging about him today?

It's because I subscribed for the monotype class. Make Monotypes with Linda Germain, which starts tomorrow. I'm a big fan of the printing textures, but I never take much time to experiment. So when I saw this online course, I thought: "this is my chance!", to play and experiment and learn more about these techniques. I hope it's a good one!