What I Saw & What I Made: Poppy Field

It’s hard to resist a field of poppies. Dorothy and her pals the Lion, Scarecrow and the Tin Man can attest to that! A magnificent field of poppies on the way to Saint Hilaire in the south of France lead to a discussion about breaking the landscape into shapes and creating gentle textural effects. I hope you like the simplicity of my little watercolour.

“What I Saw And What I Made” - is the concept for articles that comes from my pal Christopher Schink to illustrate how an artist makes changes and modifications to his subject to create an artistic interpretation rather than a more realistic rendering. I’ve pirated his title for blog postings in which you will see photos of actual scenes and then my interpretations. I hope you will find the transformations inspiring possibilities for developing your own ideas.

What I Saw:

Poppy Field

Instead of sketching things:

Sketch

 

Try this!

Break the landscape forms into shapes:

Sketch

Test out a few variations:

Sketch

What I made:

Poppy Field Painting

Saint Hilaire Poppies
10” x 10” watercolour

Happy Painting!

Linda