Paintings 2025 Acrylic on Canvas and Paper

 The painting season is over for 2025.

A lot of works have been produced and I feel that I am developing my skill every time I grab the brush and put colors on canvas. This summer I have also went back to my first way of making paintings by working with acrylic on paper. It is cheaper and can be seen as sketches for future works on canvas

In this blogpost I will first present some of these paperworks and then return to the canvas works.

Summer night

Female and Male Figures

Abstraction

My canvas works started with som adjustments of basement stored paintings where I found it necessary to improve the result if they should be put on walls here and there.

Moonlight

Act

Pride

Then I went back to my everlasting obsession to make variations of landscapes without any particular location (I paint what I saw and not what I see) 

The rough nature of Norway´s western coastline with mountains and fjords and the barren landscapes far north makes many possibilities for expressing my mind although some may found it close to their own homes.

Trapper´s hut

Going west

Boathouses

Mountain shelter 

Fjord mist

Nature can also be expressed through abstract and colorful paintings. I have made four images representing the four seasons winter, springtime, summer and autumn. They are not necessarily connected and have individual titles.

Cold Ocean

Nøkken

Summer cottage

Tree cluster

Sometimes I also want to go back to my very first experiments of making paintings by using cubism as a reference for reaching a free colorism like some of the paintings above.

Water

Trees

Mountains

Mathematics

This summer I therefore (inspired by the TV series about Ancient Aliens) I made an expression of a UFO leaving a faraway star.

Red Moon

Because I am really bad at making real portrait of living persons I sometimes make expressions like masks. This summer I had a canvas that was too narrow and too long for another landscape so another mask was worked out

The sad mask

A photo of my only male grandchild Henrik when he was performing with his guitar before an audience in England was also used as inspiration for a painting without being able to identify the face 

Henrik and Bamseklem

Calligraphic expressions is another way of making art. I have been given a Chinese name since I stayed in Singapore 30 years ago documented in my old business card. Why not put my calligraphic surname on canvas by using my ovn paintbrushes, was the meaning behind my closing painting from summer 2025.

An Liang Sheng

 

Visiting Kristiansand and Arendal

 In Norway, one of the most visited tourist areas during the months we here call Summertime, is "Sørlandet" (Southern-Norway). 

Two of the cities in this area which we never before had visited were Kristiansand and Arendal (Both cities established early 17th century by merchants from Holland). Some wooden houses from this time are still to be seen  

To Kristiansand we arrived mostly for the new Kunstsilo and " The Tangen Collection " 

Outside

Inside

A fantastic building but also with some interesting artworks present this time 

Carl-Henning Pedersen´s "Ascetic portrait" is my choice among the many spectacular paintings that was shown in the exhibition "Cosmic Dimensions" by him and Else Alfelt .

One of the decorated tables at the lobby-cafe is also worth to be included in this blogpost.

Before we left Oslo we believed that at least some of the Tangen Collection would be on the walls, but only the "Gjerdeløa" could be seen at the time we visited.

Left: Tullen sitting at the same opening as the artist Marianne Heske (right) did in Tafjord 45 years ago.

The story of the artist´s event by moving the old mountain cabin (built before 1687) from the Norwegian mountains  to Paris and the Pompidou art center, is an extraordinary milestone in international art history 

In Kristiansand skulpturs can be seen all over the city and the large jar (named Jar) made by Kjell Nupen is my choice this time. 

Before leaving "Sørlandet" bound for Oslo, we also made a pit stop at Arendal to see the famous "Pollen" and grab a sandwich for lunch which we had to share with some sparrows.

Pip Pip

"Pollen" is the most visited anchorage for boat-people visiting Arendal, and this "pirates ship" as some locals commented under our lunch was no exception 

Innermost at "Pollen" this naval mine (without explosives) is a leftover from WW one.

 

On the way through nostalgia, Remembering old paintings

 Fourteen years ago we lived in a nice old apartment with ceiling 3,42 m above the floor. We developed a great art collection based on our most favorable painters.

Per Deberitz, Sigurd Danifer and Thore Heramb had their preferred place in our living room. 

Today we are living in another apartment with much fewer walls available for paintings. The paintings on the photo below therefore had to be sold to other art collectors, and we know that some also ended up with famous art collectors, and can sometimes be part of public exhibitions.

However, one of these paintings will never disappear from my memory and today I decided to make an imitation of one. The process from sketch to signature is shown below.

Before putting my signature "A" on the lower right corner, the last changes had to be made after some comments from my kurator: Tullen

Now the "Nostalgic"has been put on the wall at our apartment entrance and can be seen many times every day

SEASON 2025, month 1 (May) Paintings Acrylic on canvas

 When the temperature in Oslo has risen to an acceptable level and the cold wind has been reduced so my fingers can hold the paint brushes without frost damages, new og changed paintings can be worked out.

This spring I have been focusing on landscape and houses. Motives from my birth town and the landscape surrounding this spectacular city may be found in the several paintings.

Variations of some central city buildings have also been worked out.

However, experimenting with colors has always been my favorite driving force. 

My only male grandchild loves to develope and perform in music together with his friends in "Bearhug" and therefore a painting presenting Henrik with his guitar found it´s way to the canvas through this acrylic blue paint

Then back to the fascination of presenting houses in various landscape and colors. 

My last painting from month May/2025 is a nostalgic view from my childhood balcony towards south/southwest with the mountain Sula and the island "Tyskholmen" in sunset. An era is over when my sister moved out of the apartment our family has lived in since 1948. Thanks B.veien 304.