Ornamentals

"Ornamentals" 12" x 12" Pastel on canvas panel

I spent three hours in the sun at the Botanic Gardens today. I took 322 photos, documenting the colors and textures of the season. I have many more photos than I thought possible to use as subject matter! So I'll begin this autumnal series with cabbages, grasses and mums. 

I met several people today. Kevin and Ned told me about a peony garden in Milwaukee where I can get several years worth of subject matter in one day. Marion and I were moved to tears as we stood in front of the tiny bonsai trees, that like their ginormous cousins, were turning the appropriate colors for their species and dropping tiny leaves.

I doubt that I'll go there again this season, but maybe once snow falls, I'll go back to capture the essence of winter before I'm weary of snow.

 Carol

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Garden Pond

"Garden Pond" 12" x 9" Pastel on canvas panel

I have yet to see this pond reflect blue. It's always muddy brown as I cross the bridge that spans from the parking lot to the island that is the Chicago Botanic Garden.  I've photoshopped it, posterized it and tried to make it prettier than it is, but nobody would recognize it if it were pristine. Strangely muddy is how I perceive this body of water that surrounds one of the most beautiful places in Chicagoland. 

The closeup flowers hang from containers on the bridge. The flowers in them change with the season. This was the view from August, seven years ago.  I always photograph from this bridge. Every trip to the Garden begins or ends with this vista.

Carol

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Hedged Wall

"Hedged Wall" 5" x 7" Acrylic on hardboard

One of the walls in the English Walled Garden is a ten foot hedge. It's one wall of a section that has brick walls on its other sides.  The dark hedge makes a lovely background for small fruit trees and mounds of blooming shrubs and perennials like bee balm and day lilies. 

This was my second painting of the morning on Sunday when I was at the Botanic Gardens with my Sunday morning painting buddies.  We paint so differently, it's always a kick to see how we handle the same subject matter.  

Carol

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Three Pots.

"Three Pots" 6" x 6" Acrylic on hardboard

Three pots nestled at the lip of a concrete pond in a section of the English Walled Garden. It was one of those dark ponds, the kind if a frog swam up to the edge and offered a kiss, you just might accept it.

I worked entirely with a knife again — a tiny one that fooled me into thinking I had a modicum of control.

Carol

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Across the Way

"Across the Way" 6" x 6" Acrylic on canvas panel

The top of a garden shed poked its tile roof through the vines and ivy on the other side of the hedge where I was painting.  It made for an interesting background detail, being the same terra-cotta as the middle ground pots and the pathway, too.

A knife painting from the Chicago Botanic Gardens' English Walled Garden.

Carol

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Garden Variety Color

"Garden Variety Color" 6" x 6" Acrylic on canvas panel

I was at the Chicago Botanic Gardens on Sunday with my Sunday morning guys. We found color everywhere!  And I'm going back to paint there again on Thursday with another group of friends. I'm thrilled to live so close to beauty.

I started this acrylic and palette knife painting the way I would normally begin a traditional oil painting… blue sky… and when I got to the color, I realized I should have come with black panels.  On Thursday I will!

Carol

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Texas Blue Bonnets

"Texas Blue Bonnets" 5" x 5" Oil on hardboard

This afternoon, despite the cold weather, and being in want of a diversion, I made my first trip of the year to the Botanic Gardens. I took 246 photos and some of them were of … yup, Texas Blue Bonnets.  I never expected to see them with my own eyes, nor to smell them or touch them, but there they were on this, the 17th of May.  Who knew they could grow in Illinois?  Or would even … want to. They smelled faintly like my childhood memory of cattle silage. Oh, the memories those blue flowers dredged up when I inhaled.  I'll look for them every year now that I know they'll come to my zip code.   

I usually take about three hundred photos during a two hour excursion, so today was a light day. But there wasn't that much TO photograph for a girl who likes to paint whorled flowers. Although, the ranunculus were fabulous. They just have way too many petals.  There are, however, about 100,000 springtime flowers in bloom right now — worth the membership.

Carol

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English Walled Garden

"English Walled Garden" 7" x 10" Pastel on paper

I painted at the Chicago Botanic Gardens this morning. The light was brilliant, the air was autumnal, and it was a beautiful day to be there.  Plein air doesn't get better than this.  

I'm learning as I go with this wonderful medium.  And I'm so thankful I didn't ignore the opportunity to explore it.  I have to thank my friend Ken Lutgen for inspiring me during a plein air session earlier this summer.  He doesn't even know it's entirely his fault.

Carol

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View From the Bridge

"View From the Bridge" 16" x 20" Oil on gessoed panel

The greens had become weary of themselves.  It had been a long season of verdant perkiness.  "Enough already," I heard the distant shoreline whisper, "let's get on with the show."

Fall at the Chicago Botanic Gardens is such a luscious departure from the spring and summer green that I find myself photographing the landscape more than the flowers come fall.

I thought this would be a nice painting on which to end the year.  Thank you for being nothing but kind to me as I've put my "stuff" out here on a daily basis, for almost six months.  I appreciate all of you. 

DPW

Carol  

Hydrangea Study

"Hydrangea Study" 8" x 8" Watercolor on paper

These were transitional plantings between garden rooms at the Botanic Gardens. The blooms and buds and incidental plants caught my eye as I passed. Dots and lines in particular. Not just the pretty petals. 


This was a refresher in using masking fluid. I masked layer after layer of dry paint.  It worked nicely. I especially like the blue-green leaves on the right. They're so cool in temperature in the midst of quite a warm painting.

See it in my gallery on Dailypaintworks.  It'll be there with 150 of my other paintings, all lined up and perky. Not just stacked, propped or dangling from Fireline in my studio.

Thanks for checking in on me.
Carol

English Walled Garden

"English Walled Garden" 9" x 12" Acrylic on canvas panel

Inside the English Walled Garden there's beauty in every direction. The light on the concrete surfaces seemed right for my intended use.

I had painted this view before, but was so wrapped up in the minutia of each pillar and blossom, that I may have lost the essence of the walled garden room. I'm happy with this rendition. 

English Walled Garden can be seen along with the rest of my blog entries by clicking here. My daily posts (of which today is number 100) funnel into Dailypaintworks.com where they can be seen and purchased.  You may also email me at Brushstrokes@comcast.net for information, or just to visit. 
Carol

Fountain Head

"Fountain Head" 20" x 10" Oil on panel

I had walked past him a couple dozen times the first year we were members of the Chicago Botanic Gardens.  He spewed, nonstop into a bowl in the English Walled Garden.  But don't go looking for him in these colors, or any others, for that matter.  He's as neutral as any public fountain and colorful in form only, being cast in concrete.  

I had no idea how to go about painting the spitting head that I had photographed on numerous occasions.   So I did it sideways—spitting to the right. I assigned color to the shadows and painted him simply as shapes.  I was surprised to see how accurate he appeared when I turned him the correct direction when I considered him finished. 

Fountain Head is listed with, and for purchase through a Dailypaintworks Auction.  He can be seen in my gallery on that site by clicking the link in this paragraph.  And today marks 100 paintings listed in my gallery on this site!

Thank you for stopping by.

Carol

Lacecap Hydrangea

"Lacecap Hydrangea" 24" x 24" Acrylic on wrapped canvas

There were dozens of them in each arrangement, but I zeroed in on the heart of one single Lacecap Hygrangea.  Probably, it wasn't how most of the visitors at the Chicago Botanic Gardens viewed the exhibit. 


I began painting this piece in a traditional way; large brush, lots of color and then I lost my mind!  I switched to colored pencil for the details; the veins, bud separations, highlights and deep shadows.  I couldn't help it.  It's exactly the look I was going for.

This painting is listed with, and for sale through a Daily Paintworks auction.

Thank you for stopping by today,
Carol

Morning Rose

Morning Rose 30" x 40" Oil on wrapped canvas

During a rare morning walk through the Chicago Botanic Gardens I discovered sunlight having its way with this rose. She blushed at being discovered, but posed, nonetheless. 

Here's where my style of sponge painting began! This white flower had so many colors in it, I had to figure out a way to paint the petals, yet maintain a believable white. Being self-taught, I was not limited by someone else's ideas, so I sliced off the end of my husband's car wash sponge and swirled a breath of color onto dry titanium white. I repeated the process with yellows and reds and blues until she looked like this!  She sold immediately.

Scarlet Aria

Scarlet Aria Oil on Masonite panel 24" x 24"

It was late in the season for day lilies. But a cluster was still performing on a slope, across the Serpentine Bridge at the Chicago Botanic Gardens.  The green-throated beauties warbled in close proximity to white hibiscus blossoms the size of luncheon plates. 

Once again, I worked my sponge from the outside in, anxious to paint the stamens.  I knew they'd be my final touches—with a scruffy little brush!  I also had to make sure the pistil didn't lead my eye off the right side by paying attention to value and edges.  

Rose #6

"Rose # 6" Oil on wrapped canvas 20" x  20"

The photo for the painting of the rose above was shot at the Chicago Botanic Gardens in Glencoe, a year ago.  It was evening, before a concert on the Esplanade.  The music was as lively as the flounce of her petticoats.  Even with another 154 luscious images in my camera, I knew I would commit her to canvas within a year. 

I first establish my darks, usually around the perimeter, and swirl them with a piece of sponge, (see yesterday's post) mixing a cool green with the warm red I'll use in the center of the rose. I pay attention to the values in the photo on my digital screen, but ignore most of that detail. I'm merely creating a soft foil to tuck behind the main player. 

Thank you for visiting,

Carol