Janet Zeh Art Blog - paintings of birds, flowers, seascapes and country landscapes.
Goldfinches hold special meaning for many people. For me, they are a sign of spring and new life. Dogwood trees ablaze in the spring sunshine are heavenly. Together a goldfinch and dogwood tree make a lovely painting.
I painted this one thinking of Mother's Day coming soon. Three little chicks share the sunlight and the sweet scent of lilacs with their mom. Lilacs bloom here around Mother's Day, so I thought they are very appropriate for this painting.
Taking a break from painting New England spring flowers today to do some tropical beauties. These orchids are climbers and can be found high up in trees. They are such stunning flowers!
While on one of my daily walks, I noticed an apple tree in bloom at a nearby farm. It was a-buzz with bees happily gathering nectar. As soon as I got home, I started a painting of these beautiful flowers including one of the bees!
These beautiful blossoms are from my crabapple tree which is in bloom. If you like this painting, you can order a print or a painting. Just use the contact link in the sidebar or at the bottom of this page to contact me. Thanks and have a lovely day!
Pin It
The other day, I stopped at the hardware store and saw they now have pansies for sale. I love this time of year when the weather is still cool because this is what pansies like! So I just had to get some and plant them in a big pot in my garden. And I just had to paint them too. As botanical illustrations are done from the live plant under controlled lighting, I brought the pot inside to do this detailed botanical painting.
Everything about this painting says Spring: the yellow finch in his bright spring colors, the soft pink magnolia blossoms against a pale blue sky. I was pleased to see that despite rain, the magnolias are still blooming. This little finch has been visiting my birdfeeder. The goldfinch and the blossoms make a lovely painting together.
Palette: My current palette for watercolors is a limited one of one red, one yellow and one blue, however the turquoise waters in this piece call for another blue. So I've added my favorite turquoise - cobalt turquoise - to my palette.
Painting the sky and distant water: Wetting the paper with clear water, I then add washes of blue to the sky leaving white areas for clouds. I wash pale blue over the distant background hills leaving the boats white and then blue and turquoise in the water dropping in a bit of yellow where the water is shallow. This will give the impression of very clear water with the bottom colors showing through.
Foreground water: Next I wet the area in the foreground and add washes of blue, turquoise plus more yellow. I love this wet-into-wet stage of a watercolor when the colors run together and I'll try to leave some of those areas showing in the final piece.
Painting the far shore: This part of the painting takes the most concentration. There are red-roofed houses on the hillside and sailboats at anchor in the harbor. Rather than use a masking fluid, I prefer to paint around the boats and houses.
The harbor, houses and hills are done: I've used cooler colors in that area since it is in the distance. Also, I've kept the detail to a minimum, even though there was a lot of intricate work to be done getting those houses and boats in!
Wave Details: The foreground needs some detail and so I paint little wavelets into the water area there in different shades of blue and turquoise. All that is left now are the coral rock formations.
Coral outcrops: One of my favorite things to paint are rocks. Not sure why, but perhaps it was all those illustrations I did for my state's Department of Environmental Protection geology department. These outcrops are painted similarly to rocks.
The finished painting: It's a bright sunny day and the water is gorgeous, isn't it? Now you can see how the yellow washed into the blue gives the impression of the coral below the surface. Wouldn't you love to take a sail in one of those boats?
One fuzzy chick has wandered into the ground cover and is enjoying these fragrant lily-of-the-valley, one of my favorites too!
It's Spring and the nesting season has begun for many birds. I love the graceful ballerina beauty of swans, so my demo painting today is of a mother swan with her little cygnets. Above you see a 5x7 sheet of watercolor paper taped to a board with the composition drawn on it and a few soft washes of color to shade the birds and denote their reflections. I've also washed the background and water with pale blue.
This nest with beautiful blue eggs was being tended by a catbird in my wild rugosa rose bushes.
Today the sun is back out, but the last few days were pouring rain, the small streams becoming roaring torrents floading over their banks. But just before the rain, I noticed tiny wild crocus flowers growing by the edge of the woods. The birds must have carried seeds from the flowers in the garden on the other side of the house.
