Sequel Roses (working title)

After a period of not being sure what to draw and paint next, I decided to do a follow up to Safeway Bouquet. Although you can’t see in this monochrome drawing, I wanted to reverse the colors in the Safeway painting; instead of a red background with a (mostly) green subject, I wanted a green background with a red subject.  I went to a fabric store and bought a couple different swaths of green cloth to use as my background.  I also bought a black ribbon, because I had liked the way the black ribbon grounded the composition in Safeway Bouquet.

Then I bought 1/2 dozen red roses, and went to work setting up a composition in my studio.  I had neglected one thing, however.  Since I had ‘cleaned’ my studio a month or so ago, I had boxed up all the vases and took them home, so the only one I had at the studio was a glass globe.  I could not use to globe to my satisfaction, although I played around with it, the roses, ribbon and cloth for a few hours.  I came back the next day with a simple cylinder vase, which worked much better.  Especially when I cut the roses’ stems down dramatically from original length.