Original artwork description:

I am inspired by the surreal paintings by Rene Magritte and aim to emulate surrealism in my still life paintings a little bit more each time as I become more confident.

This is a Rosehip painting from the new series that I have been coming back to over the last 8 years. I initially started this series painting poppyseed heads - I live in London which often makes you feel you need to hurry or keep busy and it felt important to me subconsciously spend a moment focusing on nature and stillness, the look of poppyseeds felt like the perfect subject, flowers have petals which move in the wind, but the sphere of the poppyseed head was the most still form in nature I found when walking (speed walking) around London. More recently, I have found rosehips have a similar effect but have a smoother shape and more colourful surface.

'Gothic Rose' is an acrylic painting with medium gloss of a two rosehips also known as Rose Haws, painted part from real life and part imagination. The strong tonal contrast within the flower seed and the deep violet background creates depths and a powerful presence for the rose hips. The composition is a particular favourite of mine, I really enjoy the tall thin stalks carrying the beautiful serene rose hips, to me it is very aesthetically pleasing and I am excited to seek out more beautiful compositions and create more dynamic rose hips in terms of the colours, tone, shape, leaves and contrast. It is not a direct or accurate representation of a rose hip head; the colour, positioning, vibrancy and leaves have been deliberately enhanced and exaggerated yet simplified to it's purest, elegant form.

The sides of the canvas are painted black so that you can hang it on your wall as soon as you receive it - and it has wire/sting hanging to hang on a nail too.

I really hope you like this painting and others like it and thank you for viewing my artwork. I truly appreciate it.

Materials used:

Acrylic paint

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