Tired Rose

In late October, we were about to get our first hard frost, and I rescued one of the last roses from the front yard. It was getting just a little past it, but was all the more interesting for that (rather, I like to think, like myself). I stuck it into an olive jar by the kitchen window. 

Over the next couple of days, as it started getting orangey-brown spots, the colors started to look really interesting, and I took some photos of it and started a painting. The easiest part of the painting, believe it or not, was the glass jar -- I struggled to get the flower colors as dark as I wanted them to be, and to convey the depth of the petals.

In the end I was a bit burnt out on it, and then (you know how you do) I asked some friends for their opinion of the result. The Husband loved the technical work on the glass jar, but said he couldn't make visual sense of the flower; The Abstract Artist said that he thought the glass jar a bit mundane, but thought the rose was transcendent and said something wonderful about roseness in general. I thought, fine, something for everyone, and put it away so I wouldn't be tempted to destroy it. 

When I took it out again, a month later, I found I very much liked it, from the glass jar to the rose. Sometimes you have to step away from something in order just to forget that you did it, and experience it on its own merits, untainted by its association with your inadequate self.

I used a lot of different Daniel Smith quinacridone colors on this painting -- I love almost every quinacridone paint they make. There is a light cerulean blue wash on the walls, but the dominant blue is Prussian blue, which I continue to love from the tube even though I know it is a color that can be easily mixed. 

The stem was painted mainly with a Daniel Smith Primatek paint, Green Apatite Genuine, which I bought on the recommendation of Jane Blundell. This is a Primatek color, meaning it is made of ground up semiprecious stone, and has interesting sparkle and texture. I normally avoid granulating, opaque colors like this one, but it's just so pretty as a final touch -- a perfect dark green.