I think I finally have the strawberry paintings out of my system for a while, especially since this one was much harder work than the last one. It took me at least twice as long. Anybody remember their mother sprinkling sugar on strawberries? As if they aren't sweet enough!
The reason this took so long is because originally I had a completely neutral background, like my last three paintings, but the little white sugar bowl just didn't work - it just kind of disappeared into space. I kept darkening the shadows, but then the painting just became too grey and oppressive.
I decided to leave it and come back to it - and in the middle of the night I had a brainwave - there's more than one way to differentiate an object from its background other than working on the values - the colour of course!
So this morning I got up and wiped it. I changed the background to this yummy aqua colour. I also simplified the sugar bowl lid which was giving me no end of headaches (it's a handmade uneven sugar bowl). After some other minor tweaks advised by my husband and eldest daughter, I'm finally happy with it.
(12 x 12 inches)
30 x 30cm approx
Oil on Gessobord
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