In our final 2nd Assignment we were required to “pull together our fine observation and practice” we did through the exercises in this Assignment 2 part of our Drawing 1 course.  We were allowed to make our own independent choose in terms of subject, materials and media. We could work on still life or interior scene or combination of both.  For my second main assignment I chose to draw  freesia flowers. I am not attracted to interiors drawing. I am very much attracted to the beauty of flowers and I enjoy still life painting. I was particularly attracted to the beauty of freesia flowers: their petals were so delicate, colours so fresh and their stems were so  tenderly green. While deciding what to draw and how to draw we should take into account the following factors outlined in red:

• The use of colour in drawing. I used oil paints by Georgian.
• The most appropriate medium for the subject. I found oils as the most approproia medium for my freesia flowers because oils allowed to get the right colours, shades, oils bring the sensation of softness and delicacy of my subject;
• Composition and context. While thinking about a composition I thought that I would not like to hide their  glossy flexible green stems in a vase. The stems attracted me as much as the petals. I was thinking about a composition and found a round shape canvas which gave me an idea of avoiding using any kind of vase in my composition.  
• Mark making and contrasts of line and tone. I decided to paint the flowers on the blue grey background because I thought it brings freesias  delicate and fresh colours into observer`s eye: green, white, bright yellow; red, lavender colours look naturally well on  the blue; While doing the background I added some grey paint at the center of my round canvas to create some depth.
• Accurate and expressive depiction of the form: I think I have managed to paint recognisable freesia flowers;
• Experimentation with an idea, material and method:  I picked up a round canvas for my painting because I wanted to get more attention to the flexibility of the stems and avoid a conventional approach to paint flowers in the vase. I had to experiment a lot with my medium to obtain the right colour, especially for red and lavender tones I had to mixed at least 3 colours for each.

Meeting Assessment criteria requirements analysis:

1) Demonstration of technical and visual skills – materials techniques; observational  skills; visual awareness, design and compositional  skills.

This project required  from me a lot of upgrading in my oil painting technique, especially creating subtle shades and shadows, obtaining a right colour, bringing a sense of light coming from the flowers.

2) Quality of outcome – content, application of knowledge, presentation of work in a coherent manner, discernment, conceptualisation of thoughts; communication of ideas.

I am quite happy with an outcome because people can recognise the flowers and certainly oils   appeared as a  very good medium  for drawing  delicate leaves. I think I managed to bring the idea of fresh look and tenderness of my object via my medium and colours.

3) Demonstration  of creativity – imagination; experimentation, invention, development of the personal voice.

I found that the round shape of my canvas  works really well with the object.  Thin stems of the flowers  always seemed kind of dancing for me,  so I thought them as dynamic objects not static. That`s why I avoided  having a vase in my composition. The round shape of the canvas brings a sense of dynamics.

4) Context reflection – research, critical thinking; critical reviews and essays.