Nana's honeypot

Honeypot with Flowers
61 x 61 cm (20 x 20 ")

Whether a painting is successful has a lot to do with composition and if you get the composition right before you start, painting must be so easy. Unfortunately I don't seem to be able to pre-compose paintings. Instead, try as I might, they grow organically amid much tearing out of hair and rubbing off of colour.

This painting is an example.  I bought some lilies but they were in bud and all but one dropped off the stem before they opened.  The only bloom in the garden was a giant orange hibiscus flower but I picked it and put it on the vase with the lily. This was not a flower combination I would have thought of painting  but I had a square canvas on the easel I wanted to try as a change from oblong and before I had a chance to reconsider, I began to paint these awkward flowers. I added my Nana's little honey pot to give the flowers some sort of counterweight. I have had the honey pot for years and am fond of it even though, like most of her ceramic objects, it bears the marks of robust family wear and tear. 

Getting to the flowers and honey pot was not so simple though. I changed the vase (the original was rectangle glass), I changed the pot (before the honey pot I tried a pottery sugar bowl), I put a cloth under the vase then removed it and I almost painted over the whole thing with Gesso several times. Now I have decided to leave it for a few months to see if it grows on me.