Green Apples with Tulips

I have a thing about fruit and flowers. I love the contrast of the usually soft petals with the firmer, shinier texture of most fruit. Since I also love playing with complementary colors, I liked the red/green color palette of this setup. This piece has been brewing for quite a while (I posted the drawing a long, long time ago). My original drawing was calling for a lighter background, but I decided to go for the drama of the dark instead. Maybe the next one will be light? I just might try that!
This still life is 8 3/4" x 11" and is painted on 140# Arches watercolor paper.

"Out of the Bag"

This is a playful piece, oil on canvas, done from a still life set-up. It's really showing the green/red palette juxtaposed to the neutral background setting. I've tried to make the green apple the "star" by keeping the red pear more of a backdrop for the apple. This 8 x 8 piece was fun to do. I wasn't sure about handling the paper bag, so I just looked for shapes of shadow and a few brighter edges to pull out. I just "smooshed" (a very technical term) the background and liked the effect, so I left it without further reworking. I liked that it gave it some interest and direction.

This painting is up for auction, starting today, for 7 days. You can click on the link below to view.


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Painting process--continued

Like most of us in the northeast, I'm thinking SPRING!  I had some photos from a set up I had done last Spring and never painted, so I did some cropping to come up with this charcoal sketch.  I'm a little unresolved as to what the background will be--light or dark--my photo source was light.  I may do another sketch or perhaps a color study to work that out.  This is what I like about the "painting process"--giving myself permission to try different things and just see how they work  without worrying about producing a "perfect" product.  I'm sure many artists can appreciate and associate with that feeling.