One Leaf a Day Challenge - #4

Is this a maple leaf?  I don't even know!  I just picked it up off the ground outside the gym today.  Isn't it beautiful?  As you can see, this is only a photograph.  Where's the painting?  Sigh... I had a bit of a rough afternoon and this lovely leaf is still sitting on the drawing table waiting its turn patiently.  Sadly, our dog has taken a turn for the worse and poor ol' gal, I think she might be nearing her end.  This blog is about botanical art and not pets, though, so I won't get into the nitty gritty.  Just know I would be painting if I could, but now I need to spend time with my dear, sweet companion. 

One Leaf a Day Challenge - #3

When I took Henry to see the doctor this morning, I almost drove off the road when we rounded a bend and saw the row of ginkgo trees flanking the parking lot.  Every tree was at its peak of yellow perfection today.  That mass of solid lemon yellow, with flaming orange and red maple trees in the background, and the purple Ragged Mountains in the distance . . . Man, it's a wonder anyone gets any work done in the building, with that picture postcard view out the windows!

I have to be honest, I never really liked ginkgo trees until I began to study botanical painting.  This stems from my youth, when our next door neighbor planted several ginkgo trees near the lot line and the female trees dropped their sticky (and extremely stinky!) seed pods in our tiny city garden.  My mom, who is otherwise a law-abiding citizen, got so fed up with cleaning up the mess she climbed the fence in the dark of night and gave the trees a drink of gasoline, precipitating their demise.  Our neighbor, who knew nothing about city gardening, replaced his mysteriously dead ginkgo trees with a small stand of bamboo, which quickly shot up 30 feet and became a large stand, shading our garden entirely and thus proving the adage, crime doesn't pay.

So it wasn't until I studied plant morphology that I gained an appreciation for this often maligned tree.  Yes, it is messy, but did you know it is one of the best-known examples of a living fossil?  It has not evolved appreciably since the Pliocene era,  with fossils recognisably related to modern ginkgo dating back even further,  270 million years. This is one ancient tree!  It's leaf structure is unique among seed plants in that the veins fan out individually from the base into the leaf blade, sometimes splitting but never joining with neighboring veins to form a network. This makes it fun to paint! 

I picked this random leaf off the ground, and at the time it was almost a solid, uniform yellow.  I wasn't sure if it would make an interesting painting.  But like a banana peel, it immediately began to wither and brown, so I had to drop all activity when I got home this morning (oh darn) and sit down to paint, before it lost all its lovely yellow color.  It was a challenge to paint because it was turning color before my eyes.  After a couple of hours, I had to finally declare victory and stop recording the changing hues.  Yellow is very tricky to work with, by the way, since it can quickly and easily look muddy and overworked.  It isn't one of those colors you can layer endlessly with shades and gradations.  I think I caught myself just in the nick of time.  Enjoy!

One Leaf a Day Challenge - #2

Euonymous.  The ubiquitous landscaping shrub everyone around here seems to have in their garden.  When we moved here, I knew next to nothing about gardening, and had the hardest time remembering the names of everything as people would walk around our property telling us what was growing here.  But for some reason, 'Euonymous' stuck.  Whenever someone would ask me what some shrub was, I'd more often than not say, "I'm not totally sure, but I think its Euonymous," and sound so knowledgeable.  It became a sort of joke.  Then I learned the common name, 'Burning Bush,' which didn't stick with me until our first fall, when our hedge of Euonymous seemed to literally catch fire.  The upper leaves turn first, to a burning hot pinkish red.  Finally the whole hedge becomes one huge mass of solid flaming color.  It is increadible!  We're about half way there as of today:

One Leaf a Day Challenge -- #1

Fall has been happening for weeks now but I am finally getting around to acknowledging the fact.  I want to celebrate the fabulous colors of the season by drawing or painting one leaf a day for the next ten days! As far as leaf-peeping goes, some years are more colorful than others and this year we are having a more muted show.  I love it just the same.  All those yummy, earthy tones all mixed together in subtle ways.  It reminds me of our years in Japan, where fall color is refined and understated, much like her people.

We live in a forest here in Charlottesville, so this time of year is especially beautiful as each deciduous tree changes color day by day.  Just outside our kitchen window is a stand of dogwood trees.  They are among the first trees to turn.  Never brilliant, never showy, but always a gorgeously rich shade of burgundy.  I never knew this until I started paying close attention, but the leaves that turn first are the ones most exposed to sunlight.  This makes sense -- they'd be the first to have their summer pigment supply used up as they catch the last rays of sunshine.  Or something to that effect.  I sort of forget my biology.  With the dogwood, the shaded leaves get "suntan lines" from the leaves above them.  Wherever they remain shaded, the leaf is perfectly green, and where they see a bit of sun they "tan", beginning their color transformation.   So you get leaves like the one above, with areas of intense green and darker reds, all on the same leaf.  Eventually, however, all of the leaves fade to a uniform burgundy, before drying up entirely and dropping to the ground.

I drew this with colored pencils on double-frosted mylar.  The smooth surface of the mylar is wonderful to draw on -- it accepts layers of color very nicely and the pencil just slides right along.  But the best thing is, you can erase it if you make a mistake!  Colored pencil on paper doesn't behave nearly as well.  Enjoy!

Happy Happy Halloween

Today was one of those days that didn't go at all as I had imagined. This was The Plan, more or less:

• go to lab for blood tests for physical next week (my half century check-up!)
• workout
• talk to friend Janet (in Canada) while carving pumpkin
• talk to Peter (on business trip in Switzerland)
• sit down and draw for two hours
• grocery shop
• prepare for Trick-or-treat-ers
• enjoy evening with Henry and any visiting goblins

But then this is what actually happened:
It started out fine. I went to the lab. Went to the gym. Talked to Janet. Got half way through carving pumpkin. Then picked up a phone message from my doctor who called while I was talking to Janet (Will someone please show me how to do Call Waiting?) Doc's message says, "Hi Holly. Gee we got some test results from your labwork this morning that are really not good . . . " It went downhill from there. "I need you to go directly to the emergency room . . . " What?! Excuse me?! Something about platelette count nearing a dangerous level. I went all weak at the knees. I put down the carving knife -- very carefully. I called my doctor.

Indeed, my platelette count was 13,000, according to the lab test. It should be at least 150,000. He described three very serious things that could be wrong with me, but also said it is possible that the test results are false. Still, GET TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM. Ok! I'll go!

When one is suddenly confronted with one's own mortality smack in the middle of an ordinary day and for no apparent reason whatsoever, one enters a sort of state of shock. I actually feel fit as a fiddle but suddenly I'm contemplating every cough or sniffle or bump or scrape -- is it a sign? Does low platelette count feel like anything? And what do I take to the hospital? If the test is accurate they're going to admit me. I pack my computer. I grab my book. I pack a peanutbutter sandwich. I take Ginger on a quick walk. Oh this is surreal, walking my dog while who knows what is or is not floating around in my bloodstream.

Quick phone calls and emails to various family members. Now everyone is upset, momentarily. I get to the emergency room, and wait in line behind the fifteen-year-old girl in labor. They check me in stat but I feel pretty silly occupying a bed when I really feel like sitting in a chair. The nurses and doctor are puzzled, too. They can't find anything wrong with me. Not one thing. And so I wait to get another blood test. Nervous? Not nervous? I try to remain calm and distract myself by reading my book. My sweet husband calls and sends reassuring texts from Switzerland. The poor man next to me is deaf and dumb and is having a very bad reaction to a flu vaccine (don't even get me started on this one!). The poor man across the way is in a lot of pain for some reason, but not cooperating with the nurses. I sit quietly in my little bed and wait.

Finally the doctor returns with the blessed news that I am really really fine. My count is 243,000. Perfect. Air escapes from my lungs in a huge, relaxed wave. The world stops spinning and all I want to do is to get out of there and go home and hug my family. I sign papers, change out of that stupid gown, escape to the parking garage, and head home. I stop by the university so I can hug Katie. I hug Henry when I get home. I hug Ginger. I hug the phone when Peter calls. Life is good.

I can finish carving the pumpkin after all. I can enjoy the Trick-or-treaters. Henry's friends come over for dinner and thank goodness there's plenty of spaghetti to go around. We talk. We laugh. It is all so normal it makes the afternoon seem like a bad dream with a happy ending. The boys spontaneously decide to start a music blog, and ask me to quickly draw artwork for the logo, the thumbs-up fist bump, above. Well that seems appropriate!

It isn't the pretty fall leaf I was planning to draw. It wasn't the day I was planning to have. But thank the good Lord I get to have another ordinary day tomorrow. I'll draw my pretty leaf then.

Quercus alba 'Autumn'

Now that I've finished my oak leaf painting, it is time for the administrivia . . . How and where shall I sign it?  Should I inscribe it with the latin name?  When I frame it, should it be matted in the usual way, or should I mount it on top of the mat board, to show the deckled edge of the paper?  So many little decisions to make!  And to further complicate matters, this painting is the last of three in a series, as I mentioned way back at the beginning.  I already completed 'Autumn' and 'Winter' several years ago.  So I think I'm going to frame them all together, in one big wide frame.  I think this will be effective, but it has ramifications as to how I sign each one.  (It might be tedious to see Quercus alba three times in a row, or not?) It is times like this when it would be helpful to have a teacher looking over my shoulder!  So while I'm noodling over all the many possibilities, I'll show you how 'Autumn' turned out:

Finished?

So this is the most difficult decision one has to face when making a painting.  Is it done yet?  I suppose it is easier to know when you have finished a botanical illustration compared to, say, an abstract painting.  But still, how do you know you have nailed it?  Ann Marie Evans, whose 5-step process I follow when making a painting, says there is technically speaking a 6th step, which she calls "Messing About," in her very Brittish accent.  I really try hard not to mess about too much.  I find I get myself into a muddy mess if I fool with a painting for too long. 

The goal is to paint until you have captured the essence of your subject, as faithfully as you can, and stop yourself just moments before it becomes 'overworked'.  The only way to learn this moment is through trial and error, I have found.  When I'm at the end of a painting, I start to get obsessed with perfection.  I can't "see" the whole because I am too far down in the details.  This is when I know it is time to stop.  I put down my brushes.  I take a big step back and see if I am ready to say it is done.  I let the paper dry.  Then, the next day, I sign it.  I have a little deal with myself that once I sign a painting, I don't mess with it anymore.  That's it.

So today, I put down the brushes on my Quercus alba.  I think it is done.  What do you think?  The only thing remaining to do is clean up the few smudges and dripped paint on my white background.  I'll show you that next time.  Until then, enjoy!