Many of my paintings and collages are inspired by my garden flowers. Flowers are a great source of beauty and I never tire of painting them. The possibilities are endless! This botanical collage is composed of lilies, coneflowers, and ferns.

I began with an expressive pencil drawing that I sketched from life this past July. In early spring, I sketch all my flowers from life, beginning with the peonies, irises, coneflowers. Sketching gets my creative juices flowing. As each new flower blooms, I sketch all of the blooms. In winter, I use and combine many of the sketches for new designs. I also write notes of the colors and descriptions — all the interesting details that are important when designing the painting.

All of my designs focus on big, simple shapes and a harmonious color palette. When I begin cutting the shapes, I move them around until a strong design is achieved, and then the shapes are temporarily tacked down with a glue stick. I edit and move the shapes until the design is pleasing to me and the colors do not clash with each other. The composition changes many times, right up to the final gluing process. I use an archival gessoed board for the support and apply a UV varnish after the glue is dry.