Art and Gardening: Dead heading roses and 'En Plein Air' Painting
- Naomi Odiwe
- Jun 13, 2024
- 2 min read
Art and Garden update:
Art and Gardening and En Plein Air Painting. June has been a bit sunnier than May but on each day it has either been rainy all day, or the sunny mornings have clouded over by lunchtime, followed by rain. Last Sunday however, was sunny for most of the day so I spent the early morning dead-heading my rose bushes. I've started a compost heap at the bottom of the garden so the dead petals were swept up and added to it.
The roses have been lovely this year and each bush has been laden with blooms and buds. I have been photographing them as inspiration for future paintings. The short video below shows some of the gorgeous blooms.
Art and Gardening and 'En plein air' watercolour painting update:
As Sunday had such good weather, I chose to draw one of my rose bushes that has heavy blooms with many folds of creamy petals on each flower. I thought these blooms would be very difficult to draw, but in the end, they just mesmerized me, and at the scale I drew them, the complex, soft folds of creamy white just seemed to flow from the pencil tip. I am keeping my fingers crossed for another day of sunshine so that I can finish the painting 'en plein air'.
When I'm drawing, all my worries vanish into thin air. Having a garden full of flowers to draw and paint is a blessing - it's like therapy, but with more colour and less awkward silences. 😀Check out the video below for my latest, en plein air, escapade.
Studio Work In Progress: Watercolour Calenders for Jan, Feb, March, April & May are shown in the 3 videos below:
My March & April calender paintings are now complete and I have started May so I have added the progress on these in the short videos below.
Other Work In Progress In My Studio - Tonal Flower Studies in my Sketchbook:
I have created a set of tonal drawings depicting withering peonies as preparatory work for upcoming watercolor artworks. The initial two graphite on paper sketches from my 'Faded Peonies' collection will be showcased in time-lapse videos on my upcoming blog post.
Faded Peonies 2 - shown below
Also in My Next Blog:
I hope the rain holds off long enough for me to finish my 'En Plein Air' watercolors that have been started. My May calendar is also nearing completion, and the month of June will be started soon, so I will also post an update on the progress of these pieces.
Finally, I sold my first fine art print of Peony Passionata this week. It was very exciting. The whole process was quite an eye-opener into the world of fine art printing, so I will post a 'How to Organize Limited Prints of Your Artwork Guide' in a future blog.
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Thank you for reading.
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