Each spring, I look forward to the blossoming of my neighbor's redbud tree, whose pink cloud of flowers I can gaze out upon from my kitchen and study windows. Today I wanted to spend a little time drawing, so I thought I'd check out the redbud flowers, to see what they looked like close up. To my great surprise--after 23 years of looking out at this tree--I found that the flowers are not just pink, but have a base of a deep rose color, with pink petals.
Often the particular shape of the component part of a flower has come as a surprise to me, when looked at close up, but not before the color. I am grateful to my relatively new practice of drawing (begun in 2012 and described here) for making me slow down and look carefully. There is so much to see. . .
It also interests me that in isolating one flower-filled twig of the tree, there is no hint of the cumulative effect of the blossoms on the whole tree.
What vibrant colors! My own recent experience with color in a flower was the big prickly pear bush on the far corner of our AZ lot, furthest from the driveway. The buds are a bright magenta but the early flowers were a light orange. I kept waiting for the second color flowers to appear but finally realized that the outer magenta wrapper must shrivel away once the flower blooms.
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Great sketch. Yes, sketching does make you slow down and really see!!
ReplyDeleteVery creatiive post
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