Calla Lily
by Georgia O'Keefe
A calla lily is a large white decorative flower that is the pride and joy of many a florist, photographer or painter. Georgia O'Keeffe rendered the graceful, white flower just about as well as anybody. Painting this large, majestic flower is a major challenge for any painter, but it can successfully be accomplished by most artists, if they approach the task in a logical way. When you make a painting of a calla lily, you will learn a lot about using the color white.
Instructions
1. Make a drawing of the lily. Better yet, make several drawings of the lily, because you might not be satisfied with the first one. When you get a drawing that you like, then you are ready to start the painting. Be sure and sketch the flower as many times as it is necessary until drawing the flower becomes second nature.
2. Choose a piece of paper for your final effort, and make a light sketch of the flower that takes up the whole page.
3. Lightly erase any line that you feel is too heavy. This is especially important when you work with a white-colored subject matter. All lines should be just barely visible.
4. Paint the highlight of your flower with an opaque shade of white. Pure white should almost never be used, as even a white subject will some have tint of color to it. Study your flower closely to see what colors are reflected onto the white surface. Also, you might find that the actual highlight is smaller than you first realized.
5. Paint the shadow areas of the flower. At this juncture, the color that you use becomes critical. Usually, in the shadow area, blues are dominant, but study your subject closely, for it is very possible that other colors are present.
6. Complete the floral parts. This includes the stem, the bright yellow pistil and any leaves that you might want to include.
7. Fill in the background. You might want to use a dark color for this, but that is just a suggestion. No matter how you look at it, you will need a color that accents the main subject.
8. Fill any spaces in the foreground with an appropriate color. Don't forget that, in painting, "appropriate" is a very relative term.
