Sun and Moon - Back Blogging

Sunset and bonus Moonrise!

First, I wanted to say to all of my US friends that I feel for you, the destruction from the flooding and the sadness coming out of it all, we (I) can feel all the way over here. We're thinking of you.
Here, there has been drought for a very long time. Yes, it can rain (very seldom: every 4 weeks 1 day of rain), but the ground stays dry. Having my allotment, I have been watering and pumping water from the waterways for 3 months straight now, 3 months of drought. Or more? Time races by.

I have been absent

Those who receive my newsletter know why I stopped to blog for a long while this year.
It's because 2025 begun difficult. With losses. But, of course, I'm not special in this, but to explain, it took away the usual 'workflow'.

When Spring started things improved a bit. And I painted more (first the bulb fields) and it added to my happiness. I wanted to transfer this outwardly, and I invited you to join me into painting the bulb fields. Beautiful results, will post these later also.
Then we got to realise another big idea, teaching 'across the pond', my upcoming beach class that we organise in Florida in August.

Yes, things often do turn around. Big slaps downward, huge leaps upward. Life.

Painting can snap you out of your sadness. And painting outside reconnects you to nature, the sun, and life itself. Beauty never seizes to exist.

Here are two paintings from April, the sunset, first of this season, and particularly special, a new moon, and so light, and, at almost the same spot as the setting sun. Painted on the same evening/night.

I painted both sitting down. Sometimes this would increase time, as it might induce some sort of 'laziness' sometimes (true), but it can also help a 'zen' thing. And both subjects needed haste anyway. As the sun was setting, that moon was there simultaniously. I had to paint that moon. But I also had to finish my sunset painting.
The beach wasn't filled with people, but a friend came by to chat. It was a special evening.
Only an hour after the sun had set it became too dark to continue. you can flash a light from the phone, putting down final strokes, doing last checks with a mirror, but it's not the same as 'daylight'. We went home late, yet, with that 'holiday' feeling.
The beach. The sun. The moon. And each other. LIFE!

274. SSP04-2025 Seascape First Warm Sunset 20x25 cm | 8x10" Oils/Panel | Roos Schuring 2025
These paintings are placed in my paintings shop here

275. SSP05-2025 Seascape Moonrise - a Lit Crescent Moon 25x25 cm | 10x10" Oils/Panel | Roos Schuring 2025
These paintings are placed in my paintings shop here

 Scenepics 

The sunshine warm, bright, starting painting well before sunset itself

After sunset, the sky remains light for 45 min. or so

Too dark to continue, finishing with a led if needed (phone flash light),
then wrapping up, packing up in the dark, not ideal : )

Look at that sky, the moon already higher, when we left,
but you can still see how full it was lit (!)

Nature holds all of the beauty you will need!
As a painter, as any person, as a 'human' : )
Focus on the beauty that's there. Always there.