Saturday, September 18, 2010

Yikes!,,,No more cherries! Work in Progress

I was all set to base my entire future as an artist on paintings of lace and cherries....to discover that cherries have a short season! Last week, there was not a single cherry to be found in Canada's capital...believe me, I searched everywhere:-) My next step was to search for something that was not a cherry, but looked a bit like a cherry...at least from quite a distance. I ended up buying and taking pictures of ...humble crab apples! After all, they are a fruit, they are small, shaped a bit like cherries....

The work in progress below shows my feeble attempt at painting crab apples. You will see that these look like a hybrid...I think that I could not decide if I was painting cherries or apples :-(Consequently, theses little guys are probably much overworked. The lace part is only partially done, but I wanted your opinion before spending more time on this watercolor.

The picture was taken inside, so the colors may not be not entirely true.

8 comments:

  1. The crabapples look good to me. In fact I would not have known they were not cherries had you not said so. Love that lace!

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  2. From clicking on the thumbnail and viewing the large version, I would have thought it was two cherries and an apple!
    I like the ambiguity though - it makes a painting more interesting.. I would continue :)

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  3. I'm thinking crabapples are duller in color so maybe muddy them up a bit? Or just call them cherries! I really like the way you take a bit of the lace and paint it without using it all over - leaving that beautiful white to really make the composition striking. Well done!! I'm sure you have plenty of photos of cherries to take you through to the next season, yes?

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  4. Too funny! To paraphrase another famous artist: "Christiane Kingsley - Painter of Cherries"!!! I think these look more like cherries than crab apples, but I have seen a CA in years! Just have fun with whatever you are painting!!!

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  5. Ladies, thank you for your encouragement:-) I have just been told that at Xmas time I may be able to find in my city of Ottawa some cherries from Chile...at an astronomical price, of course. My career may still be salvaged:-)

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  6. These are a hybrid, but beautiful with their breeding. Chapples perhaps :) I think you should continue.

    Crabapples here are hard green little things mostly, some with a little red in them, so these look wonderful.

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  7. My sentiments are with Deb...these little beauties do look like cherries, so, carry on! You do know that Bings look very different from Raniers and if you added a bit of yellows around nobody would know the difference anyway on future paintings. Cherries are just so wonderful to paint. We don't have any in Texas anymore either!

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  8. Jeanette, I like the new word "Chapples":-) I got my crab apples at a large fruit store - I really don't know what people do with them...they look too hard to be eaten.

    Mollie, what a great suggestions ... Raniers can really glow in watercolor!

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