Growing - Painting - Eating

Another Thing I've Never Painted

I've been trying to get out of my artist malaise

by trying new things and incorporating them in my art.

I've never really painted still life before.

I've painted vases of flowers, but to me if it doesn't have several different types of items in it

it's not really still life.

We grow a lot of produce my husband sells at the farmer's market in Carrollton

so I have access to a variety of fruits and vegetables.

I tried some peppers a few weeks ago and they were horrible.

We have an abundance of them, so I thought I'd give it another go,

but first I thought I'd draw them first.

Drawing is one of the things I'm trying to improve on,

so I laid them out on the table in what I thought was an interesting arrangement

and then I drew them and then I painted them.

  I drew the peppers and added some broken lines for the shadows and tried to get some highlights

on the peppers and then some shading and highlights on the stems.

Then I painted them trying to get the colors and the shadows to look like the real ones

and the drawing.

I was pretty happy with the result.

Then, I was able to use the peppers in my salsa.

Leave me a comment about what you think and how I could have improved it.

I always struggle with the background color.

 How do you select a background color?

Do you use a complementary color or what?

I always tone my boards with a mix of burnt sienna and white

and then I used ultramarine blue and white for the background.

I don't mix it very well so it has a streaked look 

and I paint it on the bias.

Thanks for stopping by today.