My Path Down Wilted Flowers
For the longest time -- no, I am exaggerating, it has only been about a year -- I have been frustrated at not being able to capture a perfect flower specimen for reference material. There is always a bent petal, some discolouration, a leaf in the way, etc.
The times I got a good reference photo, I preferred painting the flowers in profile and not head on. It made the paintings more dynamic, and in many ways, it was more forgiving.
First week of tulips in full bloom. Pretty colour against the light.
Since WWII, Canada receives tulips from the Netherlands and they add their own for the grand event (learn more here). Ottawa, the country's capital, has a yearly Tulip Festival and around the Rideau Canal alone where you can find over 300,000 tulips on display. Definitely worth the walk!
From the Entrance Gardens to the Restaurant, thousands of tulips in front of the Montreal Botanical Garden every spring.
On a much smaller scale, the Montreal Botanical Garden displays tulips in the spring. The vast majority in the Reception Garden. The first week I noticed them, they were still too young and barely flowering. A week later, in full bloom I was with someone and I did not have time to take many pictures. That, and as pretty as they were, especially in bunches, I found them a little 'blah' when singled out and zoomed in. That changed the third week. By that time, the colours were rich but I noticed, as I was taking pictures, that I gravitated towards the wilted tulips. Their colouring, the shapes of the petals up close were much more interesting to me than the ones from the week prior.
When I got home that evening, I painted my first Tulip Petal in my sketchbook using my Pentel Aquash. The simple design made it look like a botanical drawing (not that I know much of actual botanical terms or techniques). So I repainted it on Arches paper and used my good brushes. The result is almost identical, but it started me on my Wilted Flowers path.