Botanicals

Uvalde May 24 2022, Oil on Birch Panel, 17 x 18 inches

Faded Fall Fantasy, Oil on Linen, 12 x 9 inches

Kitchen Vase, Oil on Linen, 12 x 9 Inches. Private Collection

Little Fall Fantasy, Oil on Linen, 12 x 9 inches

Landscape with Zinnias, Oil on Birch Panel, 18 x 17 inches

Don't Be a Stranger, Watercolor on Archival Paper, 16 x 12 inches. Private Collection.

November Zinnias, Watercolor on Archival Paper, 12 x 16 inches. Private Collection

Late Blooming Zinnias, Watercolor on Archival Paper, 12 x 16 inches

Four Winter Squash, Watercolor on Fabriano Paper, 11 x 14 inches

Two Winter Squash, Watercolor on Archival Paper, 12 x 16 inches

One Pear Four Times, Watercolor on Archival Paper, 12 x 16 inches

Eight Small Tomatoes, Watercolor on Archival Paper, 12 x 16 inches

One Small Tomato Seven Times, Watercolor on Archival Paper, 12 x 16 inches

Kentucky Violets, Watercolor on Archival Paper, 13 x 11 inches. Private Collection.

Garlic Scapes 7.24.19, Vine Charcoal on Strathmore Drawing Paper, 17 x 14 inches

Garlic Scapes 7.23.19, Vine Charcoal on Strathmore Drawing Paper, 17 x 14 inches

Garlic Scapes 7.19.19, Vine Charcoal on Strathmore Drawing Paper, 17 x 14 inches

Garlic Scapes 7.24.19 7 PM, Vine Charcoal on Strathmore Drawing Paper, 17 x 14 inches

Scirpus atrevirens 8.25.21, Graphite on Strathmore Drawing Paper, 14 x 11 inches

Garlic Scapes 7.25.19 11 AM, Vine Charcoal on Strathmore Drawing Paper, 17 x 14 inches
In this group of small paintings and drawings, I look carefully at familiar forms, with an eye to understanding how, when, and where they grow. The zinnias, squashes and tomatoes all lived for a season in my kitchen garden, and I was interested in their color and their way of extending themselves from seed to fruit. The garlic scapes grew in the same raised boxes. Once I brought them inside, I was fascinated by the way they unfurled a bit more each evening after I went to bed, until finally their stems were almost erect. Charcoal seemed a better medium to concentrate on the scapes’ linear progress, whereas the vegetables, fruits and flowers asked for the clear hues of watercolor. I also use oil paint on board or linen canvas whenever a sense of time passing and the surrounding space add weight to the image. Little Fall Fantasy and Faded Fall Fantasy are the same group of flowers painted more than once during the time I worked with them in the studio.
Time passing, seasons changing —this is the world of which we are a part. Flowers that are a feast for the eyes can be a feast for the palate, vegetables conversely. We live in symbiosis with the creatures and plants of the earth.
Indra, king of the gods,
sits “in a vast and infinite net. In every juncture of the net
there was knotted a mirror,
and every mirror reflected all other parts of the net.”
(from Diane di Prima’s Recollections of My Life as a Woman)