Study of whole and cut lemons/Zorn palette

 

"Study of whole and cut lemons/Zorn palette" by Hilary J. England, oil on canvas, 8" x 11"

I wanted to go out and do some painting outdoors today, and this morning, the weather seemed promising.  I worked in my garden for a little while, and then when it was time to head out, the wind got very heavy.  I went to the store to wait it out, but it never died down, even knocking down a few portions of the fence in my yard that was a little rickety.  I decided that today was not a day I wanted to battle the wind, so I would sadly take it back indoors.

I had a lot of lemons -- some ripe, some overripe, and some underripe and I thought I would do a study of them using a modified Zorn palette.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with a "Zorn palette" -- it is a palette based on the colors used by the Artist Anders Zorn.  He used a very minimal palette of only Ivory black, Yellow ochre, and Crimson, and of course a white.  I did not use this exactly -- since I am still waiting on my Ivory black reorder, I was forced to use Lamp black, which is a much flatter less blue hued black, so to compensate, I added some cobalt blue into the palette.

I have to say, this was.a challenging palette to work with, especially when you are not used to such a limitation.  Trying to build value, chroma, and contrast with this limited amount of color was a very good exercise, and I think I will do a few more for good measure.  It's good to challenge yourself and do things you would not normally do every now and then -- keeps the mind and hand sharp!

So, hopefully in the next few days, the wind dies down, and the rain stays away, and maybe I can get outdoors like I really want to!

But, when life throws you lemons, do a still life of them! (Sorry, I couldn't resist!).

~Enjoy