"Fall's Last Hydrangeas"Oil On Linen 20x16
Thankfully, I cut this bunch just 2 days before our first hard frost. I especially love the rich colors of the plants at the very end of their season. These are cut from the same bunch I did the last hydrangea piece from. Amazing how the color changes! I absolutely loved the warmth and color vibration these were radiating and wanted to capture that warmth in the light of the painting. I like this cool blue vase and it was a nice contrast to all the warmth. My students are wondering how many more times I could possibly paint the same vase. . :)
I'm having a hard time breaking free from it (as I'm sure you can see in my other still life work:) - truth is, I just really like it! I may venture onto something new in the next piece. . . .
we'll see. . . . . . I do actually have others. . .
These are clearly not the easiest flower in the world to paint, maybe that's why I like to try? When painting these I was trying to keep in mind the underlying structure of the flower mass and am constantly asking myself if it's in light or in dark and then get the average masses in right away before I begin to note the temperature changes within the mass - color, that's the fun part! This helps me to not get overwhelmed by all the billions of little petals. This painting went pretty well besides the exception of fighting the C12 single primed linen, I don't like the single, it just seems to suck up all the paint! Back to double!
Here's what's going on in the studio right now:
I'm always so torn between being outside painting in the early fall or working on a still life piece in the studio. I try to work back and forth between landscape and still life. It seems to keep me on my toes for sure. Currently I'm working on a 30x24 landscape piece in the studio from a study done a few weeks ago. It's about 94% finished. . . . . I need to get away from it for a few days before I can make any 'rational' decisions on it.
