Spring!

I did something crazy today.   I used a white canvas.
What led to this unusual event?

Hyacinth, freesia and lemons set up

1. I observed that my daffodil bulbs were within days of opening,
2. I splurged on some bright yellow freesias and fragrant purple hyacinths at the greenhouse,
3. A nice, new stack of lily white canvases arrived in the mail,
4. I watched Daniel Keyes transform a blank canvas into a stunningly colorful fruit and floral still life on Youtube.

Spring!   A fresh new start.  A snow white canvas.  A great day to mix up a spectrum of yellows and purples on my palette.

I arranged the flowers in a mid-sized clear glass vase.   I pressed a bright white cotton linen cloth and grabbed two lemons.   I liked where this was going.   I enlisted my very willing composition expert - my husband - to help me create the set up.  To the right is a photo of the set up.    In reality, the shadows were not this blue, but rather they were lavender.

Stage 1- Sketch and shadows

After sketching in a grid of thirds and the outline of the flowers in diluted raw sienna, I studied the big shapes.  One of the things I liked best about this set up is the pattern of shadows - big fuzzy circles, triangles and quadrilaterals.   There also were some nice feathery stem shadows that overlapped other shadows.   In the places that there was overlap, the shadow was darker - but just slightly.  

The darkest dark was the shaded side of the purple hyacinths.   The freesia stems were also dark, but I decide to wait until I have at least a couple of coats of paint on the background so as to not start dragging green through my nice white linen....so unlike me.  The white-on-white stripes on the linens were so striking that I wanted them to play a role instead of just blocking in a background of light and shadow.  This was a bit scary, because the stripes were standing out and were a bit distracting throughout the painting process.    My plan was to continue to glaze over the stripes until they sat back properly.

Stage 2 -
Linen Stripes and Block in

Stage 3 -
 Tablecloth and background glaze

Stage 4 -
Stems with Buds

The linen stripes continue to show through the layers of glaze.  The end result should be an understated hint of stripes, not the pronounced look of Stages 4, 5 and 6.  I want the lightest yellow of the freesias to be painted last with thick buttery yellow.  

Stage 5 -
Lemons and Freesia Petals

The front lemon was brightly lit except for a slight shadow cast from the linen at the bottom.  The rear lemon was quite dark and as you can see, as of Stage 6, it was still too light compared to the photo at top.

Stage 6 -
Hyacinth highlights

Each of these stages were done on consecutive days.

Stage 7 -
Freesia Petals and Lemons

This last picture, Stage 8, is close enough to complete that I will put it aside, and revisit in a week or two.  Comments and suggestions welcome.

Spring Blooms with Lemons