"Spring Still Life with Bleeding Heart" (watercolor; 8" x 8")

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Another watercolor floral pick-me-up!  I am going to let you in on a secret.  The pink camellia was not pink at all in my original arrangement; I only have a white camellia bush in my garden.  When I painted the flower as was in the reference photo, it simply faded away into the white background.  I rescued it by adding a pink blush!

"Bleeding Heart Love" (oil on linen; 8" x 10") sold

sold

You don't have to be a bleeding-heart liberal to love the bleeding heart. It has attractive mounded foliage with arching stems of delicate, heart-shaped flowers. Indeed, I consider it, not the rose, the most loving plant. Its heart is so full of love that it splits up to show its innards! When she was little, my daughter used to pick a bleeding heart in my garden and give it to me as a token of her love.

By the way, I would like to say thank you to everybody who contacted me for the drawing of a print of "Spring Flowers Collage II".  The lucky winner of is Jeannelle Walker.  Congratulations!  I have already ordered the print.  As soon as I receive it, I will send it to Jeannelle.

Next month, I am going to widen the circle for my monthly drawing to all my Facebook fans.  If you haven't checked out my Facebook fan page, please click here.  I post a painting or a photo everyday.  It is the best place to get the most up-to-date information about my artwork.  Please "like" the page!

"Bleeding Heart in Green Vase" (watercolor on paper; 7" x 7")

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matted size: 12" x 12"

The bleeding heart is all curves: the heart-shaped flowers, the arched stem they dangle from, and the palmated leaves.  You can't see the coquettish green vase for this demure still life in its entirety, but I assure you that it is also all curves!

If you want to win a painting from my "Spring Fever" series at the end of the month, please sign in to follow my blog.  Thanks!

"Bleeding Heart Love" (oil on linen; 8" x 10") sold

sold



You don't have to be a bleeding-heart Liberal to love the bleeding heart.  It has attractive mounded foliage with arching stems of delicate, heart-shaped flowers.  Indeed, I consider it, not the rose, the most loving plant.  Its heart is so full of love that it splits up to show its innards!  When she was little, my daughter used to pick a bleeding heart and give it to me as a token of her love.  On top of its lovely form, it thrives in moist shade gardens.  Perfect!

I took the above picture in mid-April last year.  It is not blooming yet, although I am sure it will send me to a floral heaven way before that time this year.  It's been in the 70's everyday; it is even warmer today.  Dwarf sour cherries are blooming in my garden; they didn't yesterday.  I am in the midst of a serious spring fever, painting away spring flowers everyday.  I couldn't wait for bleeding hearts until April.

Dwarf Sour Cherries blooming in my garden

So I printed out the reference photo and happily painted "Bleeding Heart Love."  Quite a bit of drawing though.  You see, love does not come by without hard work.

Garden Flower Journal (pen and watercolor, 9" x 4" ea)

As some of you may remember, I make my own journal books with good watercolor paper.  With a full sheet (22 x 30"), I come up with six 9 x 9" pages for my journals, plus three 4 x 9" cards.  I didn't know what to do with them until I came up with a brilliant idea of making slender journals for whatever projects I felt like.  Thus was born the "Garden Flower Journal," from which I am sharing some pages today.

The idea was to keep track of the flowers growing in my garden and a nearby park through the spring (2009).  I drew directly with a Micron pen, which is waterproof, then loosely added a watercolor wash.  With the same pen, I also did the lettering and jotted down notations.  The unusual format of the paper made me work hard on the design of each page.

As I was looking through the pages of this journal the other day, an inspiration came to me.  Why not start a "Fruits and Vegetables Journal"?  Many vegetables and fruits are elongated.  Think bananas, cucumbers, green onions, leeks, zucchinis, bokchoy, etc.  As for fruits, I can line up strawberries, cherries, and so on.  For large, globular fruits like watermelons, I can slice them up.  How fun!  I will keep you posted.