"Summer Hydrangeas" 8"x10"

Oil on 8"x10" Stretched Canvas
I am very happy with how this came out!!! Yay!!

More Hydrangeas... work in progress...

I'm glad I ran out of small panels the other day.. I have been using some larger ones I have around. This is an 8"x10" stretched canvas, and I am painting my hydrangeas again along with some daisies and other flowers that were in a bouquet I received for my birthday. I got brave and put them in a cut glass vase!!! I don't quite know how to handle that, but we'll see when the time comes to paint it. I thought I would post some work in progress images. I really love this stage of a painting. They always seem to have so much promise in the beginning. I'm taking this one slow, I don't want to get carried away and put in too many details.

"Hydrangeas and Daisies" 8x10

Oil on 8"x 10" Hardboard panel

I love these deep violet blue hydrangeas that grow in my mother's yard. I have wanted to paint them for the longest time. I just never thought I could do it. I finally just decided to take my time and try it. I like how it came out.

"Bananas and Nectarines"

Oil on 6"x6" hardboard panel.
I thought I would rearrange the fruit and do another version of this painting.

"Bananas and Nectarines"

Oil on 6"x6" hardboard Ampersand panel.
This is the same painting as in the previous post. I have finally had a chance to get a better picture of it.

"Bananas and Nectarines"

Oil on 6"x6" hardboard
This painting was difficult to photograph because of the dark background, and parts of it were dryer than others. This image is pretty good though, just a bit of glare. I'll try to get a better one, once it's dry and varnished.

Studies

Oil Study on 6x6 paper
I haven't posted anything in a while, I just haven't been able to paint anything I'm happy with lately. So.. I just decided to stop trying, and started doing some drawing and a little watercoloring, and some small oil studies. I thought I'd post this little study of a white cloth. I used thalo blue, alizarin crimson, yellow and white to make the neutral gray color on a piece of gessoed paper. It's always a good exersize for me to work on seeing and comparing values.

"Plate of Fruit w/ Peaches" 8"x10"

Oil on hardboard panel
I learned a lot painting this, one was that I should remember to put black on my palette. I usually try to do without it, and make a black with whatever dark colors I have out already. I experimented with a few different ways to do the white cloth, using mixes of white with blue/red/yellow... or just a mixes of a brown/yellow ochre with white, and adding blue..??? I tried lots of things, but I wound up making a gray of ivory black and white, and adding cadmium orange.
I like it.

"Fruit Plate" Oil on 8"x10" hardboard, in progress.

I decided to try another painting of my plate of fruit. This one is larger, and includes more of the fruit, and the white cloth in the back. I changed the position of the cloth after this picture was taken, so it will look different in the final painting.
I really loved doing a larger painting for a change. It seems funny that I call an 8"x10" painting a "larger" one. But, after so many little 5"x7"s that's the way it feels. I hope to do them more often.
I like taking pictures of my work in progress, it reminds me of where I started, and what it looked like in the beginning. Once the painting is finished, I don't remember what it looked like while I was working on it, so it's nice to look back and see. I also like to write down what I did, if it's something I've done differently that I want to remember.
I'll post the finished painting soon.