Society of Botanical Artists - Assignment 5

As we move forward with new assignments, I've noticed that each one becomes slightly more challenging. Assignment 5 is all about the arrangement of stems and flower composition. I have come to realize that this is not my area of expertise. I usually only paint a single flower not multiple ones! I did a lot of research on this assignment by looking at all the master botanical artists and their beautiful works of art.

I headed to the flower shop to pick up some flowers. The florist picked three long stem roses for me to paint. Here are a few photos.

The requirements for this assignment was to have an odd number of flowers, do not show all flowers facing to the front and do not paint them in a horizontal line.

Here is my outline of each flower. To begin I sketched each flower individually. I made sure that each flower was in a different angle and the back flower head is facing away. My tutor recommended that i made these angles a bit more dramatic. I agree I was playing it safe.

The color mixes for the roses were Sennelier lemon yellow and Daniel Smith Quin Rose. I always mix all my colors in my color sketchbook for future reference.

The leaves were painted with Indanthrene Blue, Hansa Yellow Deep and a touch of Quin Rose. Under the l eaves I used Sennelier lemon yellow, Cerulean Blue and a touch of Quin Rose. For the branches I used Indanthrene Blue and Perylene Maroon.

I received an 8.63/10 - another B grade. All my scores have been in this range. My feedback was that my composition was confusing and I did not have good depth perception. They did not like the placement of leaves and I needed to move the center flower higher or shorter for more depth. And the stems at the bottom all line up and I should have made them into a triangle shape. All in all I am very pleased with it. I am here to learn and I am definetly doing that!