Rose and Wing

Here is an abstract painting I did, in this one, a rose is dangling from a winged claw-like limb or structure. In the distance on a grass plain is a small house and tree on the horizon. This painting is a tribute to Salvador Dali, inspired by his use of wide open spaces and surrealistic subject matter. I had visited the Dali museum in St. Petersburg Florida shortly before this one. I also had obtained the material to paint on at Artisan's Alley a gallery on London Ontario that used to carry some of my work around the same time.

Directional brushstrokes are useful when trying to draw the viewers eye into the focal point, in this case, it is the place where the orange shape meets the grass. To break the symmetry the orange shape is curved, and the two other centers of interest are in the upper right and lower left corners. Painting on the mat board was unusual in that the paint was absorbed almost instantly, it did not easily blend together so some of the three toned washes are choppy, but it helped with the detail on the rose and feather.

22 x 13 " (56 x 33 cm), Watercolour, white mat board. 2002