Autumn Gourd Still Life

Autumn Gourd – 6" x 6" Oil on Canvas Panel – SOLD

Here is one of the gourds Steve and I picked up a few weekends ago. It is set on top of a scarf. When I first set the painting up I was just putting together things I liked, it was not until later that I started to realize that there was quite a bit to capture. Like the pattern and form of the gourd, and then the variation of the fringe, how shadows are cast and that the red of the scarf enhances the reflected light in the shadow area to be very warm.

Currently I am going through a change in my painting methods, (I will write about it more in a later post this week) where I am spending more time looking and trying to break down the different colors I see and how to apply them in a painting. For example, how the yellow of the gourd shifts color tones from yellow to a yellow green as it enters the shadow area, however there is some light cobalt blue glancing light in the near vicinity that added shine and diffused some of the curves of the gourd. By slowing down and analyzing what I see, painting has become a whole new adventure. It is fun because every time I start to paint lately I am learning something new.

Here is a detail of the intersection of the gourd and fringe. While I was adding more detail and seeing more than regular I was still trying to keep it loose.