So, Project #8 in Art Class is the first project that we get to pick the subject matter and what media we’ll be using to create it.
I decided to paint a flower that I took a photo of at Longwood Gardens.
Here is the photo. Pretty, isn’t it?
And here is Week 1. I drew the whole thing and, per our ‘procedure’ started with painting the darker parts first. I think I mentioned in previous posts about painting that we always ‘prime’ the canvas with a neutral color prior to starting the painting. I didn’t do that this time since we wanted to keep the white background so the flower would pop.
On to Week 2. You probably noticed in the above photo that I had drawn each and every petal of the flower. And if you look below, that is not how I painted it. I started out painting each petal and then my teacher stepped in and said I should ‘scrumble’ (i.e., don’t get too detailed too soon) the flower in first with the color shades, and then fill in the details on the second pass of paint. Of course she was right – the way I was doing it the flower was starting off looking very cartoony. Scrumbling helps you see the 3D-ness of the flower early on, which helps with adding the details later. I also added more to the background.
Week 3. Starting to add more detail. This went slow because I really wasn’t sure what I was doing. And, mixing the colors to get that pink was a bit difficult at the beginning. I got better as time went along …
Week 4. More detail – I was starting to get the hang of it.
Week 5. I darkened parts of the background, fixed some shadows, and cleaned up the flower petals a bit.
And, all done!
I need to pick a subject for my next painting. It will probably be a landscape from my travels, but we shall see…
Thanks for checking in! I’ll post again soon!