Tag: lavender

Afternoon Sketches

It’s a nice semi-sunny day this afternoon, and the wind is soft, the temp is about 70F. It’s perfect for spending a bit of time sketching in ink and color some of the remaining plants after the winter clean-out.

These hot peppers are from last year – and it appears they are getting some new ones! The little tiny blobs of orange are this year’s crop – I guess it is time to harvest some of last year’s fruit. We don’t know how hot these peppers are, but we should give them a shot.

I have three different lavender plants. I am not sure which one this is – I have a tag, but am feeling too lazy to investigate. What appeals to me is the bright purple flowers above the soft grey-green foliage. They look like tiny purple butterflies to me.

This is the tulip tree which graces my front yard. It’s a strange tree – not really a good one for a neighborhood. It tends to be brittle and branches can break and fall. We have had some 6 footers and then some fall onto the sidewalk below. And then it oozes sap all over the sidewalk. Birds love it – sparrows, crows, doves, and owls have been known to visit. The leaves are an interesting shape, and while it flowers, they are not showy. However, come autumn, the leaves turn an amazing yellow-gold and drop onto the lawn – and this is what makes it so beautiful to me. Add to that, right now the bare branches and twigs are just lovely against the sky.

Colors here are very limited. For the peppers I used organic vermilion, cad and lemon yellow, a bit of Hooker’s green and cobalt teal. The lavender was carbozole violet, and the foliage was a mix of lavender, Hooker’s, and yellows. The tulip tree is primarily the leftovers on the palette, so who know what the colors could be!

And now, time to head out for some fine Thai food provided by Auntie Am and Uncle Ed!

Summer Fields

Tomorrow is a family gathering, quite possibly the first since last year. This morning I cleaned up clutter and sorted out things, did all the first-of-the-month stuff, and so on. Meanwhile, the esposo is working from home and making both beef and chicken barbacoa in between saving database lives. I have already run around town collecting goodies, as have other family members, so we call enjoy a bit of a feast and each others’ company tomorrow with good food and good company.

Of course, a girl can only do so much and then the painting gods and goddesses beckon. Once more, lavender fields call, so here some are for your enjoyment.

Technique was primarily wet, beginning with they sky and distant mountain and trees, letting things bleed into each other. I like the misty effect and sense of distance it creates, as well as the suggestion of tree-covered hills. From there, greens and lavenders, lines and directional shapes. Final details were some dry brush lines in the foreground and in the tree shapes to create texture and vertical movement. I used a large mop brush (#6, Princeton Neptune) for the entire painting until the end. At that point, I took a small stiff brush to add some of the finer lines and dots.

Part of me thinks I could have done a bit more of a light lavender color, but overall, I am pleased with this painting.

Watercolor, Arches 140# CP paper, 9×12.

Verbena & Lavender

Years ago I bought a tiny pot of Lemon Verbena, and since then it has been a wonderful presence in the patio garden. It’s hardy and easy to take care of, needing a bit of pruning, water, and occasionally fertilizer. I cut it back every year and sometimes when it’s dried up because of neglect. It always comes back. Lemon Verbena has a wonderful, light citrus scent, and the leaves are actually really good in cake!

Lemon Verbena flowers are nothing spectacular. They are teensy and have a rather frond like appearance and sit atop the branch of the verbena. They develop side branches and leaves, and if you there a lot of them, it’s really quite delicate and pretty.

On the other hand, the lavender plant nearby has rather showy purple blossoms on a stalk. I think this variety is Spanish Lavender – but I dunno! I have about 3 or 4 lavenders running around, each different, but each with a lovely lavender scent.

More in my fanfold sketchbook with ink and watercolor.

Lavender #3 – Final (For Now?)

For the last 2 or so weeks it has been appointments and appointments and ordering this or that and consolidating little things and I am so sick of it I could scream!! My lavender painting has been sitting on my easel, I see it every day, and at last I have found time to work on the painting. Finally. Oh, finally! Something fun to do.

I wanted to accomplish a few things with this painting. One was simpler, more blended brushwork throughout. I wanted to grey out the distant colors a bit for a sense of atmospheric perspective. The trees, too, need to be cleaned up a bit. I think the pale field before the second level of lavender could indent a bit more on both sides of the left hand tree. I won’t say this is a masterpiece, but it has a bit more a painterly quality in it, has a decent sense of depth, colors aren’t too overwhelming.

This is painted in Golden Fluid Acrylics. A Sta-Wet palette doesn’t keep the paints wet as they are so fluid – the heavy body acrylics work well with the Sta-Wet because they are thicker. This means working a bit differently and I have found I like them best when they are a bit dryer – great for dry brush. Too much water in the paint – or in the brush – and they can drip down on completed paintwork, or form a rather interesting craquelure.

I have been putzing on this painting for quite some time, so here is a series showing its evolution – earliest paint

15×20, Langston watercolor paper, Golden Fluid Acrylics.

Lavender #2 – Stage 2

With a hurricane, what else can you do beside bake bread and listen to music and watch TV or read a book?

Paint, of course!

Below is Stage 2 of my Lavender #2 of yesterday. I worked on brushwork, details, and all those other lovely things. It is still mounted on the coroplast and taped down, but I like to see what I have by importing the image into Lightroom and then adding a frame. It does help me see things.

I am not too sure where I am at with this painting – I rather like it, but it is a bit more fiddly than I want it to be. I tend to dab – other people I know tend to use short vertical strokes. What I would like to see is an effective stroke, simple, long or short, in my own work. Not easy to do . . .

The rain is falling with a soft sound – the air is cool – and the birds outside the studio window are twittering away. Time to get away from the lights and the lavender and enjoy the peacefulness of the day.