Artists Choose Their Favorites: Arena Shawn

San Francisco artist Arena Shawn uses the medium of watercolor to powerful effect with her sensitive yet striking portraits of flowers.

Arena says "Here's the two paintings completed in 2013 that I am most satisfied with":

Field of Gold  watercolor  8"x8"  2013

This is actually a commission and I wanted to capture the fiery colors of the golden tulips under bright sunlight. When it is completed I was very happy with the fluid quality of the painting, and the vivid sense of light I was able to convey with it. I've always somewhat dreaded painting yellow-dominated paintings, since it is hard to achieve good value contrast with it, but I am very happy with how this one turned out!

Summer Glow  watercolor  5"x7"  2013

This is a painting based on a quite bland photo with a white water lily against a background of dark lily pads, almost devoid of color. I have purposefully chose this photo as a starting point to push myself to not just take reference photos literally, and to push my imagination. I worked out a blue-purple color scheme and played with it, almost inventing colors in the lily petals on the go, and only relied on a very limited palette of three primary colors. In the end, it came out as one of my most colorful paintings. I felt I have passed the challenge I've set for myself on this one, and grown as an artist because of it.

You can see more of Arena Shawn's work at her blog and her website, and also check out her post from last year about her favorite work of 2012.

The current theme is Artists Who Blog- Favorites of 2013. Chosen artists have sent in one or two of their favorite paintings from 2013, along with some words about the creation of the work, or about general new directions and goals. There will be a fresh post each day for twenty five days, so check back often.