Painting Flowers

Here is a painting done in two afternoons. My neighbor brought these hydrangeas she had picked that same day. In Spanish, they are called hortensias. They were sitting in front of one of my studio windows. I was fascinated that they had not wilted or fallen apart the day after, so I painted them. Here I must explain that two years before I had had a conversation with a florist who told me she would "never do a wedding where hydrangeas where involved," because of their fragility. I wanted to drive over to her flower shop and tell her these hydrangeas had lasted a whole week.

I confess I am not a fan of painting flower arrangements. There is something about the subject that will make viewers smirk inside. Some people have told me I can paint flowers "so well" because I'm female. Ugh!

Should I then move on to disturbing, undecypherable subjects? "Only if you want to sell to collectors," advised a colleague, the assumption being that regular folks (those who don't care whether their art is "serious" or not) like the soothing, the familiar, the kitschy, or beauty for beauty's sake and nothing else mixed in with their art.