Mixed feelings ...

 

I will admit to missing the continuity of assignment deadlines when we were in the SBA botanical art distance course.   It's been three months since the last artwork was completed and sent away to London for final marks - and both the artworks and I have done a lot of travelling since. The space and time have been very fruitful though and there are a lot more artwork deadlines up ahead - so instead of being daunted by them I will be grateful to have the motivation and appreciate working towards a goal.

The final of the three diploma works to show here is the Mixed Study - a variety of subjects loosely combined to show flowers, stems, leaves gathered together in different perspectives and angles.    I chose plants from my garden - those that were blooming prolifically as I needed to source them easily.  No time for heading out to the garden centre or florist as the final deadline was looming.  I chose a rose, bronze cottonwood, hibiscus and frangipani - it speaks volumes about the kind of summer garden we have and the plants that survive our intense heat. 

                                                 The first stages of the flower heads positioned.
            I had drawn all the elements onto tracing paper and moved them around to find a suitable
         composition so that the colours worked well together and the placement filled the page nicely.

 

Much time was spent doing colour studies to match the individual hues ...

I used oasis foam supported in a pot and played with the flower cuttings to see how they would appear together.  Here is an unfurling cottonwood bud which I cut and then next to it you can see where I placed my work in progress artwork behind it to see how it would fit in the composition.

 And here is the 'real' flower below drawn and painted into the composition ...

 I became glued to this art table for many days and nights -

my desk started to become quite overwhelmed with paint charts, palettes of colour, water containers etc!  Not to mention the plants, flowers, cuttings, and chaos all over the house ...

 

 I always try and turn an image of my artwork into a black and white version to check the contrast and tones in a piece ... I was very happy with this one and actually preferred it to the colour piece...

It's good to step away from the artwork during a break and look at it on a computer screen to zoom in and check for any overlooked elements ...

I also like to walk around the artwork to see if it looks 'real' from all angles - the three dimensionality is what brings a painting to life and if it looks like you could pick it off the page then I'm happy.

 Only a little more to go and the artwork was complete.

 

And voila - joined the other diploma artworks on the long journey from Western Australia to London.
Thanks for joining me on this wonderful journey in botanical art!
I love hearing from you too - your comments are much appreciated x

                                                             All images © Vicki Lee Johnston

Botanical illustration finale ...

I have been a bit slow updating my blog because life truly has gotten in the way - and then some!  So much has happened I can't begin to tell you ... so instead I guess I had better play catch up with the past few months and post the remaining diploma artworks to round off the completed SBA Distance course.  This one being the botanical illustration - which I touched on in an earlier post during the height of the madness.

Rough leaf rubbings in graphite on copy paper to study venation ...

plus a lot of close work to observe the reproductive elements

It took forever to work out the composition for this artwork - so many components came into play ...

The best way for me to compose is to have final drawings of each element on various cuttings of tracing paper and then move the pieces around until they fall into place in a pleasing arrangement.

Love the flowers of the Bauhinia variegata, starting to come to life ...

I quite liked the design with these two flowering stems ... but so much more to go!!

Really enjoyed the palette ... all my favourite colours came into play ...

There was so much detail to include on this illustration - I wanted the page to be very informative - showing the flower front, side and back view - bud, calyx, unfurling bud, leaves from all angles - ripe  and dehisced seed pod - and of course the dissections which were rendered in graphite.

 Watercolour work completed ...

 This was the most difficult and time consuming piece of all three diploma works due to the research and accurate observation and detail required.  I chose the Bauhinia variegata as it was flowering profusely at the time and I had already completed colour studies to include in my mixed floral composition - once again I worked on a few artworks simultaneously to ensure I was able to complete the course on time!
I was rewarded for my hard work when I saw this artwork hung in London at the annual Society of Botanical Artists (UK) Exhibition.

 Bauhinia variegata var. 'Variegata' - Butterfly Tree

Botanical Illustration with graphite dissections

© Vicki Lee Johnston