Flower Study 41- Flowing Roses, Wedding Flowers

Flower Study #41
Flowing Roses
9 x 12
Oil Painting on Panel
by Pat Fiorello



I had an arrangement of flowers that  was an unusual project in my flower design class. The last day of class we did flowers for a wedding. The full deal- bouquets, altar flowers, even flowers to decorate a gazebo which we had set up in the classroom. We also made" pew markers" -flowers that go on the aisle in a church for a wedding. The arrangement was one sided so that it could flatly rest against the side of a pew. I liked the color harmonies of subtle pinks and off whites, so I decided to do a study of this flower grouping.
 Th nature of it was flowing, so I decided to use this as an opportunity to try to keep it really loose and capture a feeling of energy and movement.

Here is the photo of the inspiration, as well as some other fun photo's from our last day of class creating the wedding flower arrangements.

A large arrangement suitable for the altar at a wedding

Here I am in the gazebo we decorated

The final day of flower design class, my 5 classmates, and I staged flowers for an entire wedding

I'm working on a larger painting of the larger altar piece in the urn and will post that later this week.

Rose Study

                                                    
                                                          Valentine's Day
                                                                9 x 12
                                                   Oil Painting by Pat Fiorello


You don't have to set your sights on completing a major painting each time you get into the studio. Sometimes it's a nice break to simplify something and do a quick study. I was lucky enough to get a bouquet of 2 dozen beautiful roses from my husband this Valentines' Day. Instead of trying to tackle the whole bouquet of 24 flowers, I pulled out 3 roses, arranged them with a little device I have that allows me to clip the flowers in various positions ( I think I got it years ago for a botanical illustration class I once took). I set the flower grouping on a simple cloth, put a light on it and painted the study shown above. It was a good practice to  focus on the roses without necessarily adding the complexity of a more elaborate still life set up. Plus I have a remembrance of this Valentine's day I can keep long after the real flowers are gone.

                                         Photo's of set up for Valentine's Day study

Painting Roses

Day 4 of Hedi's workshop- the subject I chose today was roses.
This was the set up:

Believe it or not, these are silk flowers. Hedi's prefers to use fresh flowers, but recommends if you have to use silk flowers then get the best quality you can get and buy flowers from different manufacturers so they don't all look alike.

This was  my initial block in of the big shape of the bouquet in only transparent colors.

Then adding in the background, still with transparents.

Here's the work in progress.  ( sorry for the glare in the photo) . Almost done, but a little too wet to finish today. will come back tomorrow to finish up leaves, add some darks and see what other finishing touches might be needed.

 Lots of fun! See you tomorrow.

Artistic Cross Training

I love to paint flowers. Especially now that  the feel of spring is in the air after what's been a tougher than usual winter for many of us. Lately I've been taking a break from landscapes and been working on setting up still lives to paint from. Today I took a floral design workshop on romantic centerpieces called L'Fleur d'Amour at Halls Design School in Atlanta.  It was a lot of fun and I consider it a kind of cross training as an artist. It relies on many of the same considerations we use for painting- variety of shapes, colors, textures, direction, movement etc..

Here's the first piece I did in class, It includes a  votive candle in the center.

We did several others including one designed around a  3 foot silver candelabra which was a challenge.

It was a really fun day and a good exercise to think about design in a new medium( flowers).

Unfortunately I won't be here to paint these designs from life in the next few days while they are alive, but have the photo's to work from .  I'm excited to try out some more elaborate arrangements for future painting subjects.