When we're outside looking for a subject to paint, nature rarely gives us the ideal scene. In fact, if finding that perfect scene is our intention, we'll likely to wear ourselves out and soon
become irritated and just give up.
CHANGE WHAT YOU'RE LOOKING FOR
What if instead, we ditch our expectations and allow eyes to search--just go exploring. The scene below is not at all ideal, but
look at how the light rays are striking the irises in the upper center. Compare that to what shadows are doing to the flower on the left and that deadhead in the upper right. Poke around a bit more to find fun rhythmic patterns, textures, color variations--lots of visual stuff happening here and worth exploring for ideas.
Here's one way to play around with this image. Anything that initially catches our attention is a good place to
start. I pointed out how the light rays are striking those upper center flowers and the shadows of the two on the outside. So let's start there.
Once we've spotted something, one way to explore is to look through a rule of thirds armature and play around with
ways to include that while excluding the clutter.
The azaleas in the background are clutter, so we'll ignore them. Above, I began (upper left) just with the ones in light,
then I shifted (upper right) to include the shadowed one to the right. I brought it (lower left) in more in, and next (lower right) I expanded to include the other iris in shadow. I like the idea of including both of those in shadow, but that leaves too much negative space.
So I decided to shift those two in shadow closer in. Yes, you can rearrange nature as long as you pay attention to
what the light is doing. Next, I did a quick, loose pencil sketch of just light and shadow to see how that idea might shape up.
Here's the results of that process.
GIVE YOURSELF PERMISSION TO EXPLORE
It's surprising what removing the clutter can do. And I can safely say that any image can be moved around and edited as long as
we honor what the light source is doing. That gives us freedom for unlimited exploring and creating. And that doesn't even include all the ways we can interpret color!
HAVE YOURSELF A CLUTTER-FREE WEEKEND OF CLARITY!
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