Agapanthus : new downloadable Guided Painting Class

Agapanthus

I have always loved agapanthus and blue is my favourite colour, I remind myself not to paint every image I make blue.

As a child I loved the delphiniums my father grew every summer in the north of England. Unfortunately, I haven't had much luck with delphiniums in Queensland, it’s too hot. I saw Agapanthus the first time I visited Bermuda. I loved them, big, beautiful and blue.

One of the most important things when we came to live in Australia was to have a big garden. Our garden is a work in progress as we slowly transform the original cow paddock. One of the first plants we put in were agapanthus. I knew someone who was having a garden clear out and we managed to snag a trailer load of plants hse had pulled out.

Spring in Queensland is a beautiful time of year when the agapanthus are blooming along with the jacaranda trees. This year (2019) they are really struggling. There is an ongoing drought. In SE Queensland the conditions aren’t even remotely as dire as the western parts of the state, but gardens are struggling. Today I was out in the garden and the first agapanthus of the season is budding, which is really late.

I really wanted to paint agapanthus for a Guided Painting. A decade ago, I was lucky enough to visit the huge gift fayre at the Javits Centre in New York. An artist had made massive etchings of agapanthus. I loved them and seriously considered buying them, big regret. For GP I was worried they would be too difficult for nervous students. I have found them challenging, the multitude of stems and foreshortening is complex. I simplified the individual flowers and added the moth to follow the rule of 3.

Agapanthus has proved to be a very popular image for my live classes. Agapanthus was requested for a family reunion creative get together, and as a thankyou event for a group of ladies who volunteer for an Australian Alzheimer’s support group