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| Lavender Fields II original watercolour & gouache by Teresa Newham |
During my annual visit with my cousin to Hitchin Lavender, I found myself thinking yet again that I should use the photos I took there as the basis for a lavender painting. This year I went one step further and put something down on paper when I got home.
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| source photos and initial sketch © Teresa Newham |
I masked out some figures picking the lavender so that I could freely paint the various washes. I built the image up in layers, adding in some cornfields on the left horizon to balance out those on the right, painted in the figures, and stood back for a final look.
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| building up the painting in layers © Teresa Newham |
I didn't like it.
Some parts of the picture worked - I thought I'd captured the light on the lavender, and the sense of a wide open space - but oh, how I wished I hadn't included those figures. They interrupted the sweep of the hill and just looked wrong. I was going to have to put the whole thing in the bin . . .
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| the first version of the painting © Teresa Newham |
Except that I didn't put it in the bin, dear readers - because some of it did work, and I plain refused to give up. I painted out the figures, added more colour and spattered a lot of gouache in the foreground to give the impression of flowers. After all, who's ever going to know? 😉
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| the final version is not all that it seems! © Teresa Newham |
Lovely atmospheric painting!
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