This is another beauty from our garden, continuing the ‘big flower’ theme for a bit. Fortunately our three hibiscus plants made it through the winter and we might have more of these later in the summer. Yum.
Painting #14. Screaming Red Hibiscus. Oil on Primed Arches Oil Paper. 10×8.
I decided to try another yellow flower — even bigger this time. I took the reference photo in our garden one morning — I couldn’t believe that the bee posed long enough for me to lean in for such a closeup. I was pumped. And I guess I got pumped up again while making this painting — it’s one of my favorites of the daily paintings so far! Hope you like it too.
#12 Yellow Squash Flower & Friend. Oil on Primed Arches Oil Paper. 10×8
Reference Photo
For my next painting I decided to channel friend Helen Gallagher with some BIG flowers, painted from life from a bouquet a friend sent me for Mother’s Day. Haven’t ever done any large scale, straight-on flowers. I don’t think I captured the color of the shadows very well. I’m also not crazy about the composition, but it was a good experiment. I used the palette knife a fair amount, but not for everything. . . .
I painted from life rather than the photo below — which I snapped to record what I was generally looking at while painting.
Yellow Lilies. Oil on Primed Arches Oil Paper. 8×10.
Reference Photo
One of my collectors has bought three of the veggie watercolors I painted last year as a consequence of a workshop with Wendy Artin. And she wants a fourth so she can group them in her kitchen. What to do? A pretty cauliflower was in our fridge so this is how I spent my evening in front of the TV. . . .
I made a few mistakes since I was painting it direct — without a pencil sketch, as Wendy had taught. So I resorted to a bit of gouache so I wouldn’t have to start over!!
One of my grandsons and I harvested some flag irises from the garden on Sunday to decorate our Mother’s Day table. I decided to paint those from life for my Monday painting. I didn’t like the outcome – especially the background, which was pretty awful, so I tweaked it later in the day — and then tweaked it again today!! I’m including the first and second ‘drafts’, which illustrate my changes in scale as I reworked the thing.
#9 Flag Irises. Oil on Primed Arches Oil Paper. 8″x10″.
#9 Irises from the Garden. Oil on Primed Arches Oil Paper. 8×10
Initial Composition
This is what I did yesterday — Mother’s Day. I’m very proud that I managed to do this AND have a celebratory brunch with Pat, Will, Mariam and grand babes Will and Maya. AND have a crab imperial supper courtesy of Pat. AND a nap! Woohoo! Hope you can tell that that light blue is pond water reflecting the pale blue sky, accented with the dark shadows of nearby leaves, which allowed us to glimpse the true colors under the murk. . . . Hmmm, looking at it again this morning, I probably should have darkened hat blue a bit more. Oh well.
Koi #3. Oil on Primed Arches Oil Paper. 8″x10″
Reference for Koi #3.
I’m behind on posting (but not painting!) — here’s the one I did on Saturday. Another koi — I think of this one as ‘the beauties and the beast!, because that fish looks like a torpedo or something lethal.
As for mixing the greens, I decided to slightly increase the odds of good leaf color by adding chromium oxide green to my palette for this one.
#7 – Koi #2 Oil on Primed Arches Oil Paper. 10″x8″
Koi with Water Lilies
My plan to overdose on Shepherdstown scenes must pause. I’m tired of the greens there — and the extreme difficulty of mixing them from my limited palette. I need to do some off-painting experimentation to see if I can develop some better mixes.
In the meantime, here are some koi, which I’ve been wanting to try for years. I like it, though the composition is too lopsided to the left, isn’t it? I didn’t want to include the reference’s departing duck sailing at lower right. Should I add a baby koi down there? Or would that be too ‘coy’? Should I preserve the area as the tranquil spot where the eyes can rest?? And dang – more green issues! A problem for the future.
#6 Koi Without Duck. Oil on Paper. 10″x8″.
Koi with Duck.
Yesterday’s painting – #5 of the daily painting project!
When we saw this scene last year at Shepherdstown near the Potomac River, we didn’t know exactly what it was — discolored parapet, water culverts, old stone pillars, small gushing stream, totally shaded by trees. Mysterious. Drew our attention.
I’m thinking this painting still needs a lot of ‘clarifying’ work. May or may not ‘go back in’ and tweak it some more. I scraped off some whites above the ‘black hole’ because they were way too bight, but probably should add some other light colored patches there . . .
Stream and Culvert at Shelpherdstown. Oil on Paper. 8″x10″.
Here’s yesterday’s painting, along with its reference. I feel like I’m on a marathon and am ALREADY huffing and puffing!!
Potomac River at Shepherdstown WV – #4. Oil on Paper. 8″x10″.
Potomac River at Shepherdstown WV .