ArtisticMoods.com

One year ago on this exact same day ArtisticMoods was launched. I can´t believe it.. one whole has passed since then! This calls for a little celebration.

What happened this year? 
More than 200 amazing artists were featured on the blog. Some beginning, some advanced, all awesome, super talented and highly admired by me. Thanks to submissions I received I got introduced to amazing people I didn’t knew existed such as Shari Weschler Rubeck, Toby Penney and Valérie Belmokhtar. I interviewed an artist I had admired for a long time: Catrin Welz Stein. As the website grew I introduced themes in which my favorite works are organized in specific colors & categories (I LOVE doing this!). And just recently I opened a little sales corner where a new item will be offered for sale each month. Oh, and this also happened: I got such lovely appreciations, likes and messages from you guys that it made me blush.. Thank you!!!

What will happen next?
More art is what will happen next! More painters, more illustrators, more discoveries, more themes and more artsy items for sale. I also have some exciting news to announce:  in March 2015 I will travel to Japan where I will stay for a month, get myself drenched into the Japanese contemporary art world and will do full report of this on the blog. I still can’t believe this is actually going to happen, but it will! I promise!! More info on this will follow.

How will we celebrate?
This year has been amazing, but I lost count of the numerous hours I spent behind my computer. Many of the lovely things I find, I find online and too many of them are created in places which involve aeroplane bookings if I ever decide to see them with my bare eye. So this weekend, I decided to do things differently.

I live in Utrecht; a beautiful city in the center of Holland which is rich of history, culture and artistic events. This weekend an event called Atelier Route Utrecht was organized throughout the city which means that many artists who live here opened their studio for the audience. A geat opportunity to get away from the computer, get on my bike, make some miles and meet with some of the many artists of my own hometown. Enjoy the ride!

First stop: Johan Kuhlmann

As an artist, Johan Kuhlmann is inspired by buildings and spaces. The buildings and constructions in his works are often colorful and combined with unusual imageries which give them stories and a beautiful surreal tone. Besides his paintings, Johan also creates decors for theatre productions, furniture and stained glass windows. You can find many more of his works on his website: www.johankuhlmann.nl

Second stop: Maja Badnjevic

I Love these drawings! Originally from Belgrade, Yugoslavia, Maja Badnjevic graduated from the Utrecht School of Arts in 2004. She works with several media such as ink, aquarel and graphite and she also creates installations of which you can find more here. Website: www.majabadnjevic.com

Third stop: Eemke Koppelman

I usually limit my finds to paintings and illustrations, but visiting the studio of Eemke Koppelman was so wonderfully overwhelming that I coundn’t resist taking some shots. Eemke is a designer of artistic decors and costumes and a creator of colorful altars which are an absolute delight to look at. Eemke doesn’t have a website but you can follow her on Facebook for more information & updates.

Last stop: Bas van der Wal

Bas works with a lot of materials, but none of them involve paint. In his studio Bas explained how he uses different kinds of dirt to create different colors (when mixing them with water), and how some of his works are made with nothing but the tops of burned matches. The results are pretty impressive! More of his creations can be found on his site: www.basvanderwal.com