May Flowers Recap

Examples of my 30 days of May -"May Flower Painting Challenge"

See all 30 paintings on my DailyPaintworks.com Gallery

May has always been my favorite month of the year, but last April I had a serious accident and was temporarily in a wheelchair and spent the entire month of May on my couch, feeling sad that I had missed out on all the wonderful spring flowers. This year, I decided I would paint flowers everyday during May and I added another layer to the challenge requiring that they would all be from life- not photo's. 

I made up this challenge for myself as motivation to be surrounded by beauty and joy each day and be immersed in painting for the whole month. I used flowers from my own garden, flowers bought at a florist, on a couple of days just used my imagination. I generally set up the flowers in a vase or with some still life props or some days did close ups of a single flower. The only time I used a photo reference was for a bridal bouquet commission. The paintings generally have been 8 x 10 or smaller with a couple of larger exceptions that took more than a day to complete.

The challenge has stretched me to think of new ideas and new approaches each day. I think the discipline of painting from life everyday rather than relying on photos added to my learning.

Needless to say, May 2018 has been a lot more fun than last May was. It was definitely a big time commitment to paint every single day. I've done 30 day painting challenges before that were organized by some other people, but this one was more taxing and time consuming since it required finding and setting up the subjects rather that painting from photo references

If you'd like to see the all the paintings they are on my dailypaintworks gallery .  See which one is your favorite. Some are already on the way to their new owners, but others are still available if you'd like to have one for your own or as a gift for someone special. 

Each one was also posted individually on this blog when they were painted each day during the month of May so you can see the archives for more. Several posts show steps and reference photos if that would be of interest.

Thanks for following along!

Fruit & Flowers

Fruit & Flowers
6 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$100

A small study of a glass bottle, added the roses and lemon to bring color to the otherwise fairly colorless scene and get some nice reflected light in the bottle.

Simple Pleasures

Simple Pleasures
8 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$200

 


Took the same flowers from the "Hydrangea Bliss" painting and I did another version of it with  lighting from above this time. Sometimes I use side lighting and other times top lighting. The effects are very different in terms of mood, colors, light and shadow patterns. Note the shadows on the wall vs. tabletop in the photo's below.

Hydrangea Bliss

Hydrangea Bliss
8 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
 $200

 


I'm lucky to have hydrangeas coming up right outside my front door. Clipped a few this morning and set up a still life.   Lit it from the left. Note photo's blow out the light, so the photo below is more extreme than reality.

Keira Dreams

Keira Dreams
6 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$100

Study of a single rose- David Austin Keira roses.  The flowers from the bouquet I painted the other day are still hanging on, so trying to paint them while they last.

Hydrangea in Light

Hydrangea in Light
6 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
 $100

 

Here's a different version of the hydrangea set up I did a few days back. That one was more pastel in nature, I wanted to try a slightly different approach to push the light and shadow even more. This one's smaller, so less room for detail, but a good experiment to see other possibilities.

Sweet Heart

Sweet Heart
12 x 16 Oil Painting
by Pat Fiorello
$650

 

 I was able to get some beautiful Keira roses from David Austin through a local floral wholesaler, Cut Flowers in Atlanta. Thought they'd look great in this ruby red vase that I added to my prop collection last month.

Here are some of the earlier stages along the way.

 I took some artistic license making the vase smaller and the flowers larger- they are the main event, after all. The flowers changed quite a bit from one day to the next, so some adjustments were needed but here's how the painting began for the initial block in.

The set-up

Initial drawing or value map

Laying in the darks first

Added background value

Begin adding shadows on flowers, table top values

Add light shapes. From here, begin to refine all shapes to transitions between lights and shadows, and adjust shapes and color temperatures and needed. The final painting. "Sweet Heart" is at the top of this post.

Cool Tones

Cool Tones
6 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
 $100

 

Playing with mostly the cooler side of the palette today- blues, purples, greens  contrasted with a few warm notes.

St. Simon's Light

St. Simon's Light
8 x 10 Oil Painting
by Pat Fiorello
$300

Today did something completely different from all the individual flowers and bouquets so far this month.  Included flowers in a garden setting. Took one of my favorite watercolors done over 15 years ago and used that as the inspiration for an oil painting version of the scene. The scene was a section of Christ Church on St. Simon's Island. In the original painting I added hydrangeas which were not there- but I would have liked them to be, so added them. ( The benefit of artistic license to make the world the way you want it to look) . Here I pushed the garden even further to add more hydrangeas and complementary yellow & orange flowers. A made up garden - pieces of paint next to one another- which in context hopefully reads as a garden.

Hydrangea & Jasmine

Hydrangea & Jasmine
8 x 10 Oil Painting
by Pat Fiorello
$300

 

All flowers from my garden. It's been nice to have ready access to fresh flowers for painting inspiration this time of year.  Happy Spring!

Roses & Lilacs

Roses & Lilacs
8 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
 $200

Last week I bought both roses and lilacs to paint. Neither lasted too long- just about got one painting of each from the fresh flowers before they were done. I had hoped to put the 2 types of flowers  together, but they never made it. This painting is what I would have hoped to have set up if I would have had the real flowers to work with, so instead created it in my mind and painted from there.

Hydrangea Friends

Hydrangea Friends
6 x 6 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$100

 

Now that the hydrangeas are coming out in the garden I have plenty more fresh inspiration. Forgot how much fun hydrangeas are to paint.

Garden Trio

"Garden Trio"
8 x 10 Oil Painting
by Pat Fiorello
$300

I bought some roses that unfortunately were a little quick to die. Petals were falling off before they ever opened. However, I was able to salvage a few for a small painting and with a little artistic license brought them back to life on canvas.

I use several different approaches for painting flowers. Sometimes  i use a transparent underpainting method which I learned initially from Hedi Moran, sometimes I wipe out from a dark underpainting and this 3rd method, which I learned from studying with Dennis Perrin.

Below are the flowers under a single light source in my studio.

The initial sketch 

Blocking in darkest value first

Then adding the next darkest value (the background in this case)

Blocking in general shape of the shadow

Adding the light shapes

Palette of 4 general values used for the block in. After blocking in the whole canvas, then each area is refined for shape, value, color, edges etc..

The Green Pot

The Green Pot
6 x 6 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
 $100

 

Started out painting the hydrangeas, but soon the pot wanted to be the star.

Spring Scent

"Spring Scent"
8 x 10 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$300

 

 I don't see lilacs very often in Atlanta. I think it's too hot for them here to really thrive. But I was able to find some at one of my favorite places to get flowers, Cut Flowers Wholesale in Atlanta.  "Spring Scent" is my interpretation of these fragrant beauties.

Lilac Fun

Lilac Fun
6 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$100

 

Did find some lilacs at a floral wholesaler in Atlanta. Did a quick little study last night in preparation for a larger painting I'm doing today. Trying a dark background on the next one for more contrast. Will share that once it's complete.

Desdemona Monday

Desdemona Monday
6 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
 $100

 SOLD

Painted some flowers from my garden today. Not the best of arrangements,  so I improvised to make the one on the left larger and more detailed. These flowers are very delicate and don't do well out of water so even though I had them in a florists water tube, they fell apart pretty quickly.  Below are a few steps in the initial block in of this small study.

This Bud's for You!

This Bud's for You!
6 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$100

 

Study of a Desdemona rose bud from my garden. Below are photo's of the flower and some of the block in stages along the way.

Lilac Explosion

Lilac Explosion
8 x 10 Oil painting on panel
by Pat Fiorello
$300

 

I wanted to paint some lilacs today, but couldn't find any at local florists. Been trying not to paint from photo's this month as part of my 30 day MayFlowers challenge, so I resorted to making this one up from my imagination.
Sometimes you're just in the mood to paint purple with thick paint and you've got to go with it. The result may be a "Lilac Explosion"

From My Garden

From My Garden
8 x 10 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$300

 

Tried a different approach with this painting. Laying in the major shapes with a palette knife initially, letting it set up a bit for several hours, then refining with a brush. The set up time was important, otherwise the thick paint was a little too wet to handle.

Spring Peonies

Spring Peonies
8 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$200

 SOLD

A friend of mine  a fellow artist and instructor, Deb Nadelhofer, stopped by to visit last night after teaching her afternoon painting class. She thoughtfully brought me the flowers from a still life set up her class had been working on earlier in the day. The peonies were on their last legs, after being under hot studio lights all day, lots of petals falling off, but I managed to hold on to them for one more day. Their last hurrah as a model and inspiration for yet one more  artist.  Spring Peonies, above was what they inspired me to paint.

Hydrangeas in Blue

Hydrangeas in Blue
8 x 8 oil painting
by Pat Fiorello
$100

SOLD

Fun with the blues and lavenders of hydrangeas ( hydrangeas are tied with roses as my favorite flowers). Further experimenting with palette knife.

Below was the start of this painting, just roughing it in with broad palette knife strokes.