“Iris”, 9×12″ pastel on paper by Annie Dash Studios
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit – Romans 15:13
The Iris is not only an incredibly beautiful flower, but is deeply symbolic of faith, courage, hope and wisdom.
As one who seeks, and is deeply inspired by, the beauty of the natural world, I was delighted to see this breathtaking iris blooming in my next door neighbors’ yard one glorious morning. Many thanks to Bill and Silvia Brewer for graciously allowing me to photograph their incredible garden.
“Iris” photograph by Annie Dash
Inspired to continue my floral portrait series that began with “Magnolia”, and “Rose”, and “Hydrangea”, I created a new painting from this photograph (both shown above), this time in pastel.
For this piece, I used PanPastels to produce a painterly look for the background and underpainting of the flower blossom, then added Faber Castell Pitt pastel pencils for all the detail work. You can view the highlights of my work process in the photo collage below.
I found that I absolutely love working in the pastel medium!! Combining both painting and drawing techniques, the ability to blend and add edges, to combine fine art and illustration techniques — all allowed me to push my artistic skills and create a piece that I’m very proud of. I’m excited to continue my work in pastel!
One quick note — I always work from extremely high quality reference photos with professional prints, and recommend this for other artists as well. In fact, I was inspired to study photography in college and beyond from my desire to get high quality reference photos (you can learn more about that in the About page).
I’d love to hear from you: what are your favorite sources of inspiration, friends? Please leave a comment below.
I’m wishing you and your loved ones a day filled with faith, courage, hope and wisdom!