Bird of Paradise Flower

In the spring I had taken a photo of a Bird of Paradise blooming in my friends garden, a portion of this photo is my blog header.

I had started painting this photo in July during the summer session class at the Casa de la Cultura.  The class was only for the month of July and I work slowly so did not get it finished.  I brought it home and because I was busy with some other projects it just sat on the easel.

When I finished the Hummingbird painting in class I decided to take the Bird of Paradise back to class and finish it off.  I did and have now finished it.

One more project done.

I took the photo of Zoe and this one too early in the morning and it was a little too bright yet; but was away later, so it is what it is.

Here it is, click on image to see a larger version.  Bird of Paradise done in oils on canvas.

I have now started a new project both at class and at home.  I was going to do an oil painting of a church in a smaller town in our state of Sonora; but the best laid plans often go astray.  One day I happened to show Roy some photos of horses, that a relative had sent in an email.  He loved 2 of them and suggested that I do them in the same technique as the Hummingbird oil painting.  So...... I am now doing a head  pose at class and a full body pose at home, both in the same technique and both the same size.  It should be interesting to see what comes out of them both.  I will keep the blog updated with views as they progress.

Painting In Progress Post

I have kind of been missing around this blog this month.  I have been busy going to class 4 days a week and not really accomplishing much at home either, just being lazy I guess.
Yesterday I brought home the oil painting of the Bird of Paradise flower that I have been working on in class.  I still have class today; but wanted to bring the painting home while it was kind of dry to the touch so I didn't work on it yesterday.  I took a pastel of a cat that I have been working on at home and meant to work on that; but when I arrived everyone was sitting around the table and visiting and having snacks for the end of class "party".  We snacked and chatted and I discussed my ideas for the September class with the teacher.  He had suggested that a couple of us that have now taken both his classes start working on some new to us techniques.  One he suggested was using aluminium foil,  another lady and I liked the idea of trying this so I showed the teacher some pictures I was thinking of using for this technique and he approved one of them.  So I will be trying to paint a unique flower with oil in this technique come September.  Should be interesting.
I will continue working on the oil of the Bird of Paradise painting at home and hopefully sometime this century will finish it.  Can anyone say "Toooooo many leaves"????   Some of the leaves have a base coat and 2 or 3 other green colour coats on them now and none of them are done yet.  I haven't even begun to work on the bloom part as I wanted to get all the leaves done first.
Here is the progress so far.  Comments and critiques welcome as always.

I seem to have a problem with my books eating my bookmarks or something.  They just seem to disappear into space somewhere, kind of like the clothes dryer eating 1 of each pair of your socks, not that I have this problem anymore as #1 I don't have a clothes dryer here and #2 I rarely wear socks anymore.  I guess the gods have now realized this and have moved on to my bookmarks.  I can never seem to find one so last night I decided to make a bright coloured one that maybe?? I will be able to find easier when it goes missing.  It is definitely not a work of art; but should be find-able or so I hope.  If not I can just make another and another and another.

 

Almost; But Not Quite Done

I have been working on a pastel painting of a Bird of Paradise flower that I took a photo of in my friends garden awhile back.
This is not quite done; but it is getting there.  A few finishing touches to put on it today and hopefully I can say it is done tomorrow.
I have some sheets of 300 lb. watercolour paper here that I dragged with me from Canada when we moved.  They have been sitting wrapped up since then so I decided I would see how I liked doing a pastel painting on it. I have mixed reactions, it is different and works better to blend with a stump or cotton tip than my finger, I like using my fingers so I have had to adjust to that.  All in all it is OK; and will probably try this paper again sometime.
I also tried, only on the background, brushing it with water to get a different effect.  I wasn't all that struck by it  when it dried  so I went over it again with pastels, mainly because of my colour choice.
I think that using the water technique is a good one on this paper and it would do away with the need to spray the finished painting with fixative, so may do that again the next time I use this type of paper.  I don't think it would work on a thinner paper though.
So here is the almost done painting.