Lemons
This is the second of two still life watercolor paintings I wanted to tackle, made in Artstudio Pro on the iPad. And once again, I am quite happy with how it turned out. I took a different road this time and tried to skip doing a sketch, a strategy that worked for some of my more successful paintings. I think with the perspective involved, though, my brain got tricked and made something distorted and weird.
I stewed on it overnight and I realized I needed to start over. I needed to give the “paper” some texture, make a light pencil sketch, use a fine liner to make ink guides, and essentially treat the watercolors like an ink wash to give the impression of the colors rather than try to represent them directly. It was a nice vision!
That was how it went, at least at first. The plan didn’t meet its demise until I got to the lemons. That is because I wanted you to look at this and know it was lit by the setting sun. As I mentioned in the previous post, the sun early last week was being uncooperative and everything turned out too cool. A more adept artist might be able to gin up warmer lighting, but I still require the training wheels of my reference photos.
So when the sun finally came out on Friday, I rushed outside at golden hour and set up my tableau with the fruit to catch those beautiful, warm rays. I even decided to punch it up with the addition of an orange drinking glass. This scene was about warmth and contrast. It wasn’t long into doing a light ink wash over beige paper that I decided I wasn’t doing it justice.
I kept going over it, adding more saturation and pigment until it started to look like the reference. When I got that shadow on the table looking pretty good, the whole piece started coming together. I like how the warm colors in the foreground contrast with the cooler ones in back. I like the light retaining lines. I like the suggestion of detail in the background, as opposed to trying to pick out blades of grass or what have you. I even like the perspective lines on the table cloth, something that is almost always a problem for me.
I call this painting a success, even if it doesn’t resemble my original vision.
Medium: Digital
App: Artstudio Pro
Tools: Ink, watercolor