Impressionist Painting Still Life Floral DaffodilsFlowers, Reading, Coffee, Tea ArtSunday Afternoon

Sunday Afternoon © 2010 Karen Mathison Schmidt
8 x 8 inches • acrylic on Gessobord

SOLD

I actually started this painting last March, and it’s been floating around the periphery of my studio all these months until now, when I decided to make some time to finish it!

Not even officially winter yet, and even in the midst of Christmas preparation I’m daydreaming of daffodil blooming time. It all started when I walked out to the front yard a couple of days ago and saw the daffodil leaves already peeking up through the grass. According to tonight’s forecast, it will be our coldest night of the season so far ... 20°. The dogs and cats are all snuggled up in their beds, and the sun porch is fairly overflowing with potted plants I brought in off the front porch this afternoon. I hope those little daffodil leaves out in front survive the hard freeze!








Below are some work-in-progress photos:

The first underpainting:

Then I added a magenta glaze over the whole painting:

Then I started to add some opaque colors

into the background and the flowers:

Adding some definition around the edge of the tin table insert:

And adding even more opaque colors:

Developing shadows around the book and starting to

add a few highlights to the scrolled metal chair and the cup:

Above: almost finished, but I didn’t like the shape of the cup, so I fixed it (below). I decided the little decoration on the inside of the cup rim just looked like a smudge, so I took it out. Finally, I added more color definition to the flowers and the picture in the book, heightened the background color just a little, and softened the border design on the tin table insert.

And now, the painting ... she tells me she is finished!