Irises Plein Air

Watercolor on Arches paper 12 x 9″ (scanner cut off inch on bottom)
To enlarge, click image, select “All Sizes”

I work from home Monday mornings and when we finished a conference call at 12:30 my boss said, “Bye Jana, now go have a nice afternoon painting.” So I did! But first I had lunch in my sunny backyard on the chaise lounge, eating a salad and reading a book on painting. Then I dozed off and had a lovely outdoor nap (I’m so much happier since I gave up being a workaholic!). When I woke up, I made a cup of coffee and got out my wonderful Valpod watercolor easel which I set up on the sidewalk in front of this bunch of irises in full bloom in my front yard.

Stopping point before moving indoors

I drew the irises in pencil and then quickly started painting since the sun had moved and the shade was quickly moving over the flowers. The roses behind them were already dark in shade. I got as far as the picture above before moving indoors for dinner. After dinner I worked a little more on darkening the background and negative painting around the stems and leaves, trying to suggest lots of foliage without drawing it all.