E-CARD: MERRY CHRISTMAS, HAPPY NEW YEAR

My neighbour from across the street, the webdesigner Adriaan Oprins, and I made this Christmas e-card. We had a lot of fun thinking it up! Feel free to send it on to your own friends - you can just copy it and include it in an email as an attachment. Putting it in the body of an email often won't work since Outlook 7, the most widely used email program, won't play animated gif-f iles.

Happy holidays! Next year I'll be back with a new website.

KOPENHAGEN - MY VISUAL COMMENT

And this is my view on the Kopenhagen climate summit that starts today...

The guy who drew for Coraline - Jon Klassen

I loved the animation picture Coraline (the girl who refuses to have buttons sewn over her eyes) and just found this American illustrator Jon Klassens website. He worked on that movie doing 'visual development.' His illustrations are sooo beautiful.

So I wanted to share this with you!

SWINE FLU / MEXICAANSE GRIEP

OBAMA AND SARKOZY: WATERCOLOUR

Do you ever wonder what they talk about, the leaders of our world?
The Obama's and the Sarkozy's?

I do.

Whenever I see a picture like this in the newspaper I just can't help studying the faces and gestures and guess at what they were saying. And thinking. Even though I know they are only doing a photo-shoot and every smile is fake.

So I make up the conversations.

Very often I think I  may well have been right.

ANNE TYLER QUOTE COLLAGE

The American author Anne Tyler is my favorite author to this date. She has written dozens of books about normal people leading unusal lives, or unusual people leading normal lives (The Amateur Marriage being my personal # 1, but you might know her from her books that have been made into movies, like Dinner At The Homesick Restaurant). Tyler writes those character driven books in an almost laconic style. But the people who inhabit her books have thoughts that make you stop and think. Those people - often women -  will think things that you might not even have admitted to thinking yourself. Which is what I love - to look inside other people's lives and even read their thoughts. Almost always what I feel is recognition and compassion - my personal belief is that we are all much more alike than we think.

The quote on this collage is from her recent novel 'Digging to America', which deals with adoption.

FAMILY ART 2

Today was Affordable Art Fair day - I went to see my sister's latest paintings in Amsterdam. Yes, folks, this posting is full of blatant family favoritism - so skip it if you can't bear it! I love her work, our house is full of it. I just can't help it. Don't we all like to buy art from the people we love? Francis just returned from a trip to China and that shows in her most recent paintings. My absolute favourites were two of her smaller paintings. Francis always paints women and unlike us they don't seem to grow old.

Next my 12 year old surprised us with a neat little wood carving depicting his grandmother.. more or less.

Yes, she likes the colour purple and yes, her hair is grey. So it's pretty correct. I just love the tiny little feet. Almost as good as his miniature goat painting of a couple months back.