Late Spring Paintbrush

"Spring Paintbrush," 5 x 7 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press paper

Today's the kind of day that makes you yearn for late spring or early summer.
Instead of gray skies and cold and gloom in the air and on the news, I can dream of sunny skies, fluffy clouds and wide open prairies and trees full of green foliage....
And wildflowers. Bluebonnets in Texas for sure, and fittingly and especially in Oklahoma, Indian Paintbrush, in multi-colored reds spreading out over the hillsides and prairies and along the roadsides.
Today's watercolor finally  overcame the depressed gloom of our current crisis. While it's not a masterpiece, and carefully executed, it does capture what I feel...
Our late spring paintbrush...we need your color and beauty now.

Oklahoma springtime challenge--watercolor

"Wildflower morning," 5 by 7 watercolor, 300 Lb. d'Arches

"It might as well be spring."

                                                                  --Rodgers and Hammerstein

Where there is aging and death, there is also life, bursting forth  in every season if you look, but especially in spring.
Nothing captures that truth for me like a field full of wildflowers, especially around metaphorical old farm buildings--Bluebonnets in Texas or Indian Paintbrush and many others in Oklahoma.
Morning of a new year, of new life--Springtime in Oklahoma--WorldWatercolorMonth day 8 challenge.

Redbud Impressions

Eastern Redbud, 6 by 8 watercolor

Hey, we don't have mountains here, but Eastern Oklahoma does, and besides, I can dream. It's a difficult tree to paint because you can't get all the colors or blooms or leaves, so you go for an impression. Here's another attempt at capturing the beauty of our state tree, the Eastern Redbud, with a few Indian Paintbrush, the state flower, starting to bloom.