A Rose is A Rose, 9 x 12, oil on linen
This is another painting for The Olive Grove Project. As mentioned in the previous post, the Grove is not just about the ancient olive trees. The incredible rose garden is just too good to dismiss, so here's a painting of a beautiful peachy pink rose.
detailPainting flowers, particularly roses has its own intrigue. It's not an easy thing to paint primarily because they are so delicate, yet a timid brush will not yield that sense of freshness and spontaneity I look for in these paintings. You have to really look and understand the gesture of each petal and execute each stroke with utmost care. That is not to say you have to follow form necessarily, but it helps to know exactly why you're NOT following form with your stroke, should you decide to deviate from the predictable.
detail
A curious thing about painting these flowers is that contrary to many a solid object - and these do have solid structure - the darker areas (in between petals) maintain saturation of color. In many cases the shadow areas have a lot more saturation than the lighter areas. Kind of counterintuitive, but there it is. I assume it's because the translucency of the petals let light through and intensify the colors, but even areas where light isn't coming through the petals seem to hang on to rich chroma so... what do I know? I just paint.
5 comments:
I think you've got it right Terry. The rose pedals, unlike a human ear, for example, are somehow less intense with light shining through them.
From an ear, you get the intense red when the light shines through and reveals the blood, i think. While the roses' color exists on the surface.
But, I agree too when you say, 'what do I know'?
On another note, thank goodness you've changed your blog!
My biggest complaint about the old system was just how slow it went. It was painful. I felt like I was on a dialup connection!
I think instead of copying the rose, you studied it closely and captured its character and gesture.
Thomas, I didn't realize it loaded slowly for some people. It actually loads quicker for me - but I'm glad to hear it works better now.
david, yep. that was my intent. happy to know that came across!
Yeah Terry I don't know why it was so slow for me... I'm using firefox and a cable modem... maybe the apple websites have a grudge against PCs!
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