Painting White

"White In Italian Pitcher"

20x16 Oil on Linen

Last week I went to the market to find some inspiration in the flower section and ended finding it in all the varieties and textures of white! I never quite know what I'll end up with until I'm standing there immersed in all the colors of flowers. This day it was white! A few years ago I found this old Italian pitcher at a second hand store and thought it would be perfect with this bunch of white.

I used the branch on the table to soften the painting and build some what of a circular composition bringing the eye back around. The one leaf touching the pitcher helps to connect the loose branch to the the pitcher supporting the design.

It's a fun challenge to paint this variety of whites in one painting, I find it very harmonious. I started off by building all my shadows, which were fairly cool compared to the lit areas of white. I'm always concentrating on my 'averages' in each mass before I start breaking in my subtleties. When I paint flowers, my goal is never to paint a literal interpretation of each little petal but rather respond with paint to the character of each flower's growth. I pay attention to their shapes, texture and color temperature compared to what's around them. The more I paint flowers, the more I realize that when I am working and struggling on correcting what I think to be INcorrect, it usually ends up being what's AROUND what I think is incorrect that's incorrect! Whew, ya still with me?? :) And when I fix it's neighboring color and value, I find my solution! Big reminder, everything is relative to it's surrounding neighbor color and value! So, with that said, here you have it, "White In Italian Pitcher"