Wildflower Meadow 30 by Roz Edwards
This week’s artwork of the week is contemporary wildflower meadow floral painting. The artwork in in acrylics and is painted on board. Size 50 x 50 x 0.5 cm. Roz has created the piece in a modern style with dotted brush marks. The flowers, including daisies and cornflowers stand proud amongst this summer field.
Here are Roz’s words about her work.
A wildflower meadow painting, based on fairly naturalistic colours. This one shows the beauty of summer field. Part of my continuing series of wildflower meadows paintings, which I paint for two reasons. Firstly, I love painting them and try to make each one a bit different from the others. Secondly to make people aware of the fact that 97% of the UK’ s natural wildflower meadows have gone due to modern farming. These meadows are essential for pollinators, and we must try to preserve them. This one is painted on canvas board. The board is flat and will need framing, however, it does not need a frame with glass.
About the Artist
I am an artist living in SW England, who loves to paint bright bold colourful paintings. Working from my studio which looks out over trees and fields towards the Quantock Hills and Exmoor. I am inspired by this, as well as my own colourful garden.
My entire career has been with art. Firstly as an Art teacher (11 to 18 year olds) for many (very many!) years. I also taught Photography, Ceramics and Art Textiles. Finally, I left teaching to become a fulltime professional Artist.
I have many artistic influences from the Impressionists to Aboriginal art and I also use my own photographs as inspiration. When travelling I look for ideas for my paintings wherever I go. I exhibit in galleries, art fairs and exhibitions, mainly in the south and south west of England.
My main focus is TREES and WILDFLOWER MEADOWS. I specialize in contemporary tree paintings, in a range of styles. Some are very realistic and detailed, some impressionist dots, others focus on patterns and negative spaces between branches. In some I use a restricted colour scheme, other can only be described as an explosion of colour.
I love painting contemporary floral art, and was a full member of the Society of Floral Painters, until the society closed. My main focus is wildflower meadows. 97% of native wildflower meadows have been destroyed by modern farming methods. They are essential for pollinating insects and bees.
By painting them I want to let people know how beautiful they are. The flowers all tangled up in the grass are so pretty! They are great fun to paint too, building the scene up in many layers. I also paint some landscapes and a few wildlife paintings as well as a wide range of varied, detailed textured abstracts.
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Questions to the Artist
Firstly, wildflower Meadow 30 is a lovely piece of art. What technique do you use, if any, in your floral meadow paintings?
I always start my paintings with very dark paint and gradually work through medium and then light tones. This gives greater depth to the work. Starting with big brushes and end up with very thin brushes for all the small details, such as the layers of grasses.
I work from a mix of photographs I have taken, inspiration from my previous paintings and often just my imagination. My paintings change as I do them, and I rarely have a finished idea in mind when I start them.
I sometimes use a splattering technique, just flicking and dropping paint on to the canvas. This is at the start and middle of the process, to build up a background texture to the work. The final layer is more controlled with details being carefully positioned and painted with fine brushes.
You are obviously inspired by nature. Are there any artists who have inspire you too?
Yes, nature is my biggest inspiration. The shapes, patterns, colours, contrasts etc. will always be the starting point for me. As far as artists go, I have always loved the Impressionists. I don’t have a favourite one, as it varies all the time.
Do you always work in acrylic paints, and if so, is it your favourite medium and why?
I mostly work in acrylic because it is easy to work with. It dries quickly and you can layer it up. The colours are strong and can be altered with mediums and water. It is a very forgiving and flexible paint. Also, I have never liked the smell of oil paint and the fact it takes so long to dry.
I am hopeless at watercolour as I can’t build up layers and it ends up a complete overworked mess. In the past I have used a mixed media technique with acrylic and oil pastels. I blend the oil pastel on top of the paint and then seal it with a medium. Then I can work another layer of paint on top and repeat as needed. I sometimes mix ink with my acrylic paint too.
How long does it take you to produce one of your wildflower meadow paintings?
I usually have about 5 to 10 paintings on the go at any one time, therefore it is difficult to say how long an individual painting takes. As I work in layers. you have to allow work to dry between sessions. Also, the size of the painting is a factor. My large paintings can take several months, but they are not worked on every day. If I did a small one, start to finish without doing anything else, it could be done in about 4 to 5 days. But a lot of that would be drying time between layers. I also like to work on lots of paintings at the same time so I can work on the ones that inspire me most on the day.
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