Wildflower Season

Am I getting ahead of myself? It’s too early for wildflowers here, but I’m counting the days. 

I assume you are, too. Who doesn’t enjoy wildflowers?  Not only are they varied and interesting, but they also pop-up in unexpected places and add colour and interest to the landscape.

My Wildflower Inspiration

While wildflowers appear in cities, I get most of my inspiration at the lake.  We have a cottage in northwestern Ontario in the Canadian Shield that we frequently visit from May through October.  It’s a rugged, wild landscape with rock escarpments, numerous lakes and covered in coniferous trees interspersed with birch and poplar ( photo below - view of our lake ). 

Painting Outside

I usually paint wildflowers ‘en plein air’ though I admit to occasionally using reference photos in the winter. For me, there’s no better experience than sitting outside and and painting the latest wildflowers to appear. Below is a photo of the the first wildflower painting I did at the lake. It was done in watercolour as are most of the paintings done at the lake.  We have no water filtration system and I dislike putting the water from cleaning my toxic paints into soil.