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Writer's picturePieter A. Pienaar

The Story of Trees: Bastion

Updated: Jan 21, 2021



This morning I when I took the dogs for a walk, I took my camera with to take a few photographs of the Kuruman River which flows through a section of our farm. Every four decades or so it graces us with its presence, so I thought it wise to take a few good photographs of the landscape with the river, while it is still flowing. When it is dry and things look bleak, we can take courage from these photographs; miracles happen. I started painting (and drawing) the trees I am blogging about during August 2020 and the arid landscape has been completely transformed by the wonderful rains we have received.


If you have not seen my videos about the Kuruman River coming to greet us twice, here is your chance, I will provide the links here. Within the course of a week it came, dried up almost completely overnight and then it came down again, five days later. Those of us living here thought we were in heaven and people came from far to see it and to swim here.

On my homebound journey this morning I walked past the tree which I will introduce as “Bastion”. I will include a photograph I took this morning so you can look at the difference.


As I was working with the images of these seven trees, I became aware of how I can trace my artistic “development” with regards to this collection. When I started, I was rather hesitant, but gradually the style became more spontaneous, as you will see in the next blogs, God willing.

This brings me to another idea which popped up into my mind this morning: style. So often we can look at an artist’s oeuvre and we react negatively or positively (obviously), but it is a pity we don’t always have access to that particular artist’s journey and what led to the stylistic features of his or her work. The story is often more fascinating than the mere work we see; if we had more information, we could have been more appreciative of the end result we are beholding. If you want to know more about such a process, do some reading about Piet Mondrian and his process with the apple tree which eventually led to his iconic linear works.


Well, without further ado, let us have a look at “Bastion”. As I was painting this tree, I tried to portray something of its textured bark, which remains a challenge, especially if you are more of an expressionist, like me. However, I got the twist of the branches right, which compensates for it lacking a detailed textured bark, I hope. Even though I was working with watercolour, I was actually applying it more like acrylic paint. I think the darker first layer – which was on the paper when I started - perhaps necessitated my “heavier” application of watercolour paint.


The myriad of smaller twigs and branches can drive one a bit dotty, because one cannot paint them all and render them in detail, if one is painting on the actual scene, so I suppose one has to eliminate the “extras” to reveal the “bastion” or basic structure. I used an old-fashioned ink pen with a nib which I dip into ink to create an "illusion" of detail with regards to the smaller branches. I usually apply the ink lines at the end of the painting process.

Thank you for spending time here. See you at the next tree and remember there is art in your heart.



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