Minnesota florals series

While on a trip to Minnesota in August, I took a ton of photos of flowers and foliage. I am terrible at gardening, so don’t grow flowers of my own, so maybe that is why I was so enthralled with the abundance of color and beauty.

I took the photos with my phone and as I was browsing through them later, I was really struck by the geometric patterns created by the stems in the background.

I also noticed how extreme the contrast between the lights and darks were. I was beginning to have an idea of some abstract art inspired by these photos.

Here are four of the works I came up with from those photos… plus many forms of media: collage papers, colored pencil, watercolor paint, acrylic paint, neocolor II crayons…. and whatever else was handy to use on these! Here is my interpretations:

Gathering Orange

Exploring Green

Saving White

These were a fun departure from my normal styles of work, and I enjoyed the complexity of them. It was actually kind of relaxing to work in such detail, but I did begin to feel it in my shoulders.

All four of these pieces were done on 11 x 14 inch watercolor paper. I matted and framed them to match in 16 x 20 inch simple black frames. Follow the link for each piece to check on its availablility and location.