Heaven on Earth : Painting Roses

A Yellow Rose on my easel

Painted in my garden this afternoon

The sun shone brightly today. Monday is a day I dedicate to administration for exhibitions, tours, workshops and answering the many emails I now am used to receiving. I am nowhere near through them all but I just could not ignore the sunshine. 

I took my watercolours and paper and sat listening to birdsong as I began to work on a yellow rose that sits beautifully underneath my cottage window. This is such a stunning bloom. It has touches of orange on the central petals but the outer edges of the same petals in places are blessed with a hint of pink. Interestingly the Daniel Smith Opera Pink I use so vividly in other paintings worked so softly here that I became even more impressed with it as a shade. It interacts well even with Cadmium Yellow. It moves where I wish it to merge and it can be just as wonderful as a whisper of a colour to when I use it full strength on bolder coloured subjects.

Painting this afternoon was my idea of heaven. Just me, my paper and the rose. To make my painting time even more magical the perfume of the flower wafted towards me as I worked. And just as I was about to take a break a bee came and sat on my painting before realising this wasn't a real flower at all but simply a work of art.

How lucky are we who paint. To see beauty, to understand beauty and try to capture it in our work.

This has to be the very best way to live.

We are also lucky if we feel these emotions. How great life is when we are blessed by the beauty of nature and the ability to enjoy it.

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