Sprouts With Sunflowers Update

I watched a PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) painter creating her magic on paper with watercolor the other day and was mesmerized by the systematic approach with which she attacked her subject.  Each step was calculated with precision and executed with a deftness that only comes from hours, maybe years, of repetition.  Unfortunately, when she was finished her painting, though lovely, lacked spontaneity or originality and was completely void of any mistakes; in short, it looked like a painting that had been created by the numbers.

My painting approach is not that systematic.  In fact, I don’t have much of system at all.  What system I do have can be summed up with the following: “I start with a nice drawing and hope to hell I don’t mess it up with paint.”

That is exactly the case with the current watercolor, “Sprouts With Sunflowers”.  I started out with a nice drawing and now I am hoping that I don’t screw it up with paint.  A few days ago I painted in the background and today I started the under-painting of the flowers, mainly working on the center of the sunflowers.  It is my intention to use the yellow as a base layer and then cover it with a dark color which I will sprinkle with salt.  The hope is that the salt will absorb most of the dark paint leaving the yellow to show through, thus rendering the look of a pre-seeded sunflower center.  Hopefully it will work.  If not, I’ll try something else – systematically, of course.