Dimensions: 1.2 x 1.2m
My sister commissioned me to paint a picture of flowers for her in late 2002. She agreed to pay for the canvas and left it with me. I decided to combine some flowers, the image of the Redheads, and the bee together to make things more interesting. The box and the bee were painted from life-size models. The vegetation was from my imagination to give a swirling effect similar to Grain. This proved to be mind-breaking as I struggled to get a depth of field and the realism that I wanted out of the vegetation. I realised that I should have made a model of the lot and painted it from life but it was too late to go back. In the end, painting it freestyle did give me a lot of freedom with colour and I used this a lot to help break up the image. There is also a poem hidden beneath the foliage about my sister and I. It took two years to complete, working weekends, and was finished in 2005.
Kieren Paynter 