White Daisies

Pastel on AS paper
14"x18"

Here is what a Dear Friend of mine also an artist had to say about this particular painting:

"I have stared at this a long time and get no sense of photography whatever. In fact, I know with absolute certainty no camera can do this, not even come close. The composition is too perfect. There is a touch of minimilism here that is so bang right it rivets our attention. The fallen petals, the number and placement - if one was removed it would be sorely missed, if one was added it would be too much. (Were they there? I would not be the least surprised if you did some decision making there.) The daisy on the table is spaced perfectly from the vase, and the direction of the stem is invaluable.At first glance I had a feeling the diagonals exerted a downhill tilt, but the verticle of the vase and dasies, the strong shadow mass on the wall, the minimal strew of petals leading to the daisy with the stem pointing up-left, all counterbalance the hint of tilt. So does the parallel dark where the vase shadow bends up the wall. The whole is a very subtle tension of compositional balance that is... masterful, why not say the word.You have even taken pastel itself in a different and exciting direction. On one extreme of pastel painting is the over blending that turns the colors into cotton candy. At the other extreme is the fashionable demand that pastel colors be slashed on to produce something called "loose, bold, painterly." Both can in fact make for beautiful and visually rewarding images. But your dasies are under the perfect control of an artist who marches to her own drummer. This image is strongly suggestive of an oil painting - done a few hundred years ago, most certainly. The light and darks have subtle transparency that do not make any shouting claim on any particular medium. The vase is a vase, catching, absorbing, reflecting light in an almost modest way. And all the more substantial for it.Did I say I am very much impressed by this painting? "

Saintluke