Magnolias

These magnolias are growing in my back yard garden.  Although they are actually white, I preferred to generate contrasting colors on a blue/purple background.  Again I wet the paper and dropped in color.  After it dried I studied it at length before deciding to pursue the magnolia sketch design.  Lots of water with mingling shades of pink, magenta and yellow created the flowers with chrome green and indigo dropped in the carve out the shapes of the petals.  Although not totally realistic, this is a vibrant painting that gave me a great deal of satisfaction to paint.

Petunia Basket

"Petunia Basket" captures the vibrancy of flowers that I have hanging on a fence next to my patio.  It started as brushes of color on a totally wet piece of paper.  Then, with both positive and negative painting, the shapes emerged.  I plan to frame and hang this painting on my front porch.

I had such fun carving shapes out of random patches of color that I have caught the fever to do even more.

Christmas Hemlock Card

This is the photo of the scarf that was the basis for the color selection for the Hemlock Painting, below.  I did this as part of a color exercise while taking a mixed media class.  We were to choose a favorite object, or clothing or anything.  Then, replicate the colors in a painting.

This Hemlock Painting uses the colors of the scarf.  Quite a lot of experimentation went into finding the right combination of watercolors to approximate the colors of the scarf.  

The painting technique relies on negative painting to get a highly textured result.

I painted this on a quarter size sheet of Arches Paper (11" x 15").

This is the Christmas card that I had printed by Vista Print.  I selected the card imagery from many, many choices.  Then I uploaded a digital image of my painting into the white space provided. I also created the inside of the card and the back (not shown here).

Then after using the painting for my Christmas card, I framed it and hung it on the front porch in a sheltered corner out of sun and rain.  I will leave it there until spring, I think.  Then, I will find another painting to use in the same spot.  I have done this before and had no problem with weather damage--didn't even get spider nests on the back!