Rosa Damascena. Acrylic on 36×36″ wood panel
Back to painting a little today after all the festive distractions – added ultramarine blue overlaid with cerulean blue (left) to the background of roses which I think balances the painting colour-wise, then scraped back the paint for more texture (above).
No show of snow here in Edinburgh! But here are some of my winter-themed paintings from the past few years …
‘Elie Bay 2’. Mixed media on 10×10″ wood
‘Elie Bay’ finished today – this was privately commissioned by someone as a surprise Christmas present for his partner (who liked my previous painting of Elie Bay on the east coast of Fife). I think it’s fairly similar and hope it’s happily received!
Today’s painting on the theme of the rose of Damascus.
I’ve decided to rename the series Rosa Damascena to avoid possible associations with my name, since someone recently said – ‘I didn’t know you were born in Damascus’. !
I was discussing a future exhibition of these with an artist who suggested mixing essence of rosa damascena with the paint. It’s a nice idea but as it’s about £10 per ml (a teaspoon is 5ml) this would be a bit pricey! I did in fact order a couple of mls of pure absolute of rosa damascena recently, so instead of mixing it with paint (which would taint the perfume anyway) I’d most likely dab a bit on the hand of each viewer as they entered the exhibition (or a card if they preferred). The room would be beautifully perfumed by the end of the preview! – the scent of rosa damascena is different from the tea rose (which is what we mostly see in the UK) which has a light, almost lemony/apple scent, quite sharp and soapy, though sweet and floral. Rosa Damascena is sweeter and much deeper, with a peppery edge – if you can imagine the scent of Turkish Delight magnified quite a bit.
It’s tricky to get an idea of scale so here’s my hand against the painting, and a few details also showing the sides of the panel (plywood panel 3×3 ft and 2″ deep) …
Some more work on Damascus Rose today, quite a rainy day so I couldn’t paint or photograph much beyond 3pm as it was so overcast (hence blurry photos).
I’ve showed more of the process and details below. A lot of it was painting the blue swathe then making rose patterns in wet paint with my nails, then repeating till it seemed right. I won’t really be able to tell until there’s some natural light tomorrow.
A bit more work on Damascus Rose today, adding more layers. The light was getting very dim when I took this so it doesn’t show colours exactly as they are. Here are previous stages..
Rose Strang Artworks 