Arantza Sestayo

Arantza Sestayo
Arantza Sestayo

Arantza Sestayo is a Spanish painter and illustrator who works promarily in the genres of fantasy and imaginative realism.

Her highly refined paintings and drawngs show the influence of Victorian painting, Art Nouveau and the Pre-Raphaelites. (Her image above, bottom, may be a nod to J. W. Waterhouse’s depiction of jealous Circe.)

Sestayo applies her skills across several mediums. If you scroll down on the home page of her website, you will find categories that translate as “Oils, Watercolor, Pencil, Comic, Sketches and Digital”. There is also a section featuring her book cover illustrations.

A number of her pieces are illustrations for a deluxe limited edition of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland from Easton Press.

You can find several videos of her process on YouTube.

 
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Eye Candy for Today: Ingres pencil portrait of Mme Lethiere

Madame Guillaume Guillon Lethiere, née Marie-Joseph-Honoree Vanzenne, and her son Lucien Lethiere, pencil portrait drawing by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres
Madame Guillaume Guillon Lethiere, née Marie-Joseph-Honoree Vanzenne, and her son Lucien Lethiere (details), pencil portrait drawing by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres

Madame Guillaume Guillon Lethière, née Marie-Joseph-Honorée Vanzenne, and her son Lucien Lethière, Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres; graphite on paper; roughly 9 x 7″ (24 x 19 cm); in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY.

I’m a great admirer of Ingres’ sensitive pencil portrait drawings. This one is a bit unusual, more finished than most, and featuring a background of Roman architecture.

 
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Eye Candy for Today: Bernardo Bellotto pen and wash drawing

Imaginary View of Padua, Bernardo Bellotto, pen, black ink and gray wash drawing
Imaginary View of Padua, Bernardo Bellotto, pen, black ink and gray wash drawing

Imaginary View of Padua, Bernardo Bellotto; pen, black ink and gray wash drawing; roughly 13 x 17 inches (32 x 43 cm). Original is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

18th century Italian artist Bernardo Bellotto had a very effective pen and wash technique for rendering architectural subjects that is similar to the wonderful drawings of his uncle and mentor, Antonio Canal, better known as Canaletto.

Imaginary View of Padua, Met Museum

 
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Eye Candy for Today: Rembrandt pen drawing along the Amstel River

A bend in the River Amstel near Kostverloren House, Rembrandt van Rijn, pen and brown ink drawing, with wash
A bend in the River Amstel near Kostverloren House, Rembrandt van Rijn, pen and brown ink drawing, with wash (details)

A bend in the River Amstel near Kostverloren House, Rembrandt van Rijn; pen and brown ink with brown and grey washes, heightened with white bodycolour on oatmeal paper; roughly 5 x 10″ (14 x 25 cm). Original is in the collection of the Chatsworth Estate.

It would be easy to glance at a drawing like this — a sketch really — take it in briefly, and pass on by, on the the next, more colorful artwork. But to me, these pen and brown ink landscape drawings by Rembrandt are among my favorite works in the entire history of art.

Many of them, on more devoted looking, reveal themselves to me as transcendent and poetic.

Perhaps it’s because I can project myself into them — even better than with a more “realistic” painted view — and picture myself sitting there on the bank in the shade with my own sketchbook and pens, immersed in the day, the smell of the river, the sounds of water lapping at the boats, the gentle clop of the horses passing by, perhaps a gentle breeze waving through the sun-topped line of trees.

Just as easily, I can picture Rembrandt sitting there — a sheaf of paper in his lap, reed pen and brush in his hands with perhaps two bottles of iron gall ink at his side, one full strength, one diluted for washes — immersed in the scene and his drawing while his troubles (of which he certainly had his share) recede into the distance.

As far as can be determined, these pen, brown ink and wash drawings were created simply for Rembrant’s own benefit, either as practice, or (I think) simply for pleasure. There is no known connection identifying them as preliminary for paintings or even for any of his similarly handled etchings.

Many of these, and other Rembrandt drawings in brown ink and wash, are listed as drawings in bistre ink (made from wood-burning soot), but chemical analysis indicates that a high percentage of them may have been drawn with darker iron gall ink, usually made from oak galls, iron salts and tannic acid. I’m guessing that may be the case here.

Renbrandt’s notation is breezy, economical and seemingly effortless. Just a few gestural lines — but brilliantly sweeping, lightly touched with tone — produce a solid line of trees, a river and its bank, boats and horsemen. Their sun bathed and shade dappled textures are created almost entirely in our mind’s eye.

Because it has happened to me on occasion, I have the distinct feeling that drawings like this might have felt to Rembrandt like they were flowing directly from nature, into his eyes, and out through his pen onto the paper — while he observed. There is little feeling here of artifice or the construction of a drawing as a work of art.

You’re unlikely to see what I mean from the small image and detail crops I can present here. Go to this link and view the drawing as large in your monitor as you can to get the feeling I’m trying to convey.

 
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Eye Candy for Today: Fragonard wash drawing

View of an Italianate park with figures, a villa behind, Jean-Honore Fragonard
View of an Italianate park with figures, a villa behind (details), Jean-Honore Fragonard

View of an Italianate park with figures, a villa behind, Jean-Honoré Fragonard, brown wash over brown ink lines and black chalk, roughly 13 x 11″ (33 x 47cm); link is to Sotheby’s past auction, large image here.

In this beautifully sensitive drawing, 18th century French painter, draftsman ad printmaker Jean-Honoré Fragonard, who specialized in such things, gives us an idealized view of an idealized park on an ideal day.

I love how delicately and vaguely some elements are suggested, like people, architecture, stairs and background foliage, and yet how definite and complete the overall drawing appears.

This is one of those drawings in which the vague word “wash” is used to describe the medium, leaving me in question as to whether it is ink wash or watercolor, both of which can be used to similar effect.

 
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Eye Candy for Today: Francis Seymour Hayden etching

The Lovers Walk, No 1, Francis Seymour Hayden, etching and drypoint
The Lovers Walk, No 1, Francis Seymour Hayden, etching and drypoint

The Lovers’ Walk, No. 1, Francis Seymour Hayden, etching and drypoint, roughly 9 x 13″ (23 x34 cm); in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, look for both download and zoom links under the image.

This deceptively simple etching by the British painter and printmaker (active in the late 19th and early 20th centuries) uses sweeping, seemingly casual lines to create texture — and, in effect, color — in a composition that invites you to step into the image. Notice the small, delicately suggested figures to the right of the first grouping of trees (images above, second from bottom).

 
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