Flowers and Fechin by Roxanne Steed

8"x6" oil on linen mounted on archival panel

For more information or to purchase, click here.

By the time mid-winter sets in, I am snow weary.  I'm getting antsy to be outside, but either it's too cold, or as in yesterday's case, it was possibly warm enough, but there was no place for me to park in my usual painting spots without risk of getting my little car hung up on an ice berm. (and doing some permanent damage!).  By the time I got to the 4th place of looking yesterday, I did find a place to park in a safe place, where I could actually walk out to a safe place to paint, without falling into a deep drift of snow....I was tired, hungry, and seeking 'facilities'. Yes, I shot the whole morning looking for a 'place' outside to paint. By the time I got home, my husband had delivered flowers for Valentine's day! - Yay!!! Some wonderful painting material and beautiful colors to cheer up a dreary winter case of 'ice-blues'.  

Painting ...and learning to paint, is all cumulative. You spend years learning, experimenting, combining some techinques, eliminating others.  All of it eventually comes into play at any given time to make up you 'the artist'.  I have been toying with combining several different techniques that I have employed over the years, using both brush and knife, laying some thick & thin areas with transparent oils in the darkest areas, topped with ever lighter layers.  Thanks to my hubby for the wonderful flowers. I usually never stack things on my art books in my studio, but I had placed this bouquet on top of my Nicolai Fechin book (that was on top of the large Edgar Payne book).  So of course I decided to paint them this way as well!  I hope these flowers last, I think I might spend the next several days painting more bouquets!