Showing posts with label Fall foliage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fall foliage. Show all posts

Friday, March 15, 2013

Graceful Changes

Fall Fire watercolor on Yupo  5x7" by Meera Rao

Season is changing again - we turned our clocks forward and of course love the signs of spring  everywhere.  I was doing the spring ritual of cleaning my studio, moving my paintings around and realized I never did post this painting of the firey bushes from my backyard.  They greeted me when I got back from my trip to India and I was taken away by their beauty.  The bushes are now once again showing signs of greeting the spring after the cold winter. 

I came across a slide show from NASA Jet Propulsion Lab about Change of Seasons- view from space. Check out the slides for an enlightening view of changing seasons as seen from satellite pictures.

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Remembrance, The Lasting Perfume


Memories of a bloom 2 watercolor on Yupo 5x7"

Pleasure is the flower that passes; remembrance, the lasting perfume.  ~Jean de Boufflers

I saw these stalks with dried out flower pods, petals, leaves still attached while on a walk couple of years ago in Colorado.  This painting is the second in the series capturing the memories of that cold crisp morning. I used the same techniques in this painting as in the earlier one.  My plan is to  change or add  one color to each of the painting to give each painting its uniqueness as well as making it a part of the series. They are small paintings but take time to complete since each layer has to dry completely before I lay the next one. You may check out the first painting here

Talking about memories I recently came across an article highlighting the fact that memories are not fixed but flexible and can be manipulated very easily: "....memories are surprisingly vulnerable and highly dynamic. In the lab they can be flicked on or dimmed with a simple dose of drugs. “For a hundred years, people thought memory was wired into the brain,” Nader says. “Instead, we find it can be rewired—you can add false information to it, make it stronger, make it weaker, and possibly even make it disappear.” Nader and Brunet are not the only ones to make this observation. One of the scietinsts, Nader further wonders:  "What actually happens when we recall the past? Does the very act of remembering undo what happened? Does a memory have to go through the consolidation process again? " 

A little further the article points out a fascinating point: "While neuroscientists were skeptical of Nader’s findings, cognitive scientists were immediately fascinated that memory might be constantly revamped. It certainly seemed to explain their observations: The home run you hit in Little League? Your first kiss? As you replay these memories, you reawaken and reconsolidate them hundreds of times. Each time, you replace the original with a slightly modified version. Eventually you are not really remembering what happened; you are remembering your story about it. “Reconsolidation suggests that when you use a memory, the one you had originally is no longer valid or maybe no longer accessible,” LeDoux says. “If you take it to the extreme, your memory is only as good as your last memory. The fewer times you use it, the more pristine it is. The more you use it, the more you change it.” We’ve all had the experience of repeating a dramatic story so many times that the events seem dead, as if they came from a novel rather than real life."

So I wonder, how much do I change my memory when I sketch and paint things I encounter?   

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Patience Is Not Passive


memories of a bloom  watercolor on yupo  7x5.5"

Patience is not passive; on the contrary, it is active; it is concentrated strength. 
~ Edward Bulwer-Lytton

I have to fully agree with that quote! The little painting on Yupo took a couple of days and lots of determined patience on my part as I layered paint and waited; used a tooth brush to splatter some paint and waited;  dabbed with a wet tissue and waited; added paint in one section and took away paint in another. And repeated the process a few times!  I think finally I see the little plant in the sunshine with dried twigs and memories of a lush little field around it. 

Saturday, October 24, 2009

Brilliant Hues and Vibrant colors

Today I read that the combination of warm wet spring, typical summer conditions and sunny warm autumn with temperatures above 32F in the cool evenings is ideal for brilliant foliage colors. And Biology of the plants also plays an important part too in giving the leaves their brilliant hues and striking vibrant colors - carotene in the leaves are responsible for orange and yellow colors and xanthophyll for yellow of leaves. Besides these, there are three other pigments that help the foliage coloration -anthocyanin are responsible for blues, reds and violets; tannins give brown color to the tea, chestnut barks and the fall oak leaves; the flavones are what make the yellow of the sumac, tea and onions. If the cell fluid is acidic we see more reds otherwise it will lean towards blues. What a spectacular show mother nature provides us every year ! And as always I am so grateful that I get to enjoy these displays and marvel how it all comes together.

I tried to capture a bit of that beauty in Glory Days (watercolor 9x11"). I used layering, splattering and wet on wet to duplicate on paper what nature seems to do so effortlessly! I had found the leaves and mushroom in a puddle of water that was reflecting the blue of the sky. My sun glasses also deepen the colors and in the end, the walk I took on that beautiful fall day was not only a feast for the eyes but also nudged me towards trying the combination of colors in my painting. I always bring my special finds home only to find them teaching me again and again that all things change and its their nature.
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