Discover a fresh, fun approach to painting unique flowers! Forgo reference photos and discover a more organic and joyful way of painting! With its friendly step-by-step format, Painting Imaginary Flowers features a simple, three-stage approach to creating flowers only you can make... 1. Drop in color (ink, watercolor or fluid acrylics) to create abstract backgrounds full of beautiful textures and "blooms." 2. Just like spotting shapes in the clouds, search for shapes in your background that suggest blossoms and leaves. Paint around them and watch the flowers emerge! 3. Add patterns in pen to create a lovely, faux collage effect. With plenty of mixed-media techniques throughout for building up luscious texture and color, even beginners can achieve happy results. Ten demonstrations show the versatility of this approach--from large-format pieces, to work in a series, and even Zen doodle landscapes. Never again will you be stuck for ideas or dependent on a photo. Every flower you paint will be unique, personal, and fresh from your imagination! Let your imagination blossom!

In Expressive Flower Painting, artist Lynn Whipple presents a range of creative painting exercises that help beginners develop vibrant nature paintings.

In this wondrous picture book bursting with mixed-media art, an imaginary garden is the center of a special relationship between a girl and her grandfather.

Twelve imaginary blooms on twelve canvases - one for each

"'Blue dog speaks' is the first book to emphasize Rodrigue's witty and insightful titles alongside his works. Both playful and thought-provoking, this beautifully illustrated gift book will delight Blue Dog fans and introduce newcomers to the pop culture phenomenon that is Blue Dog"--Back cover.

An exciting new approach to flower painting with step-by-step demonstrations for creating contemporary flower portraits and landscapes that are truly unique. This is more than a ‘how-to’ on flower painting. It is a guide encouraging artists to explore new and exciting ways to create flower paintings bursting with individuality and moving towards a contemporary and impressionist style. Mixed-media artist Soraya French, well known for her gloriously vibrant flower paintings, shares the secrets of her work, with expert advice on all aspects of this endlessly rewarding subject. The book covers: Colours, shapes, patterns and textures particular to various flowers through the seasons, from fresh green foliage in the spring to rich red and gold hues in the autumn. How to incorporate flowers in both still life and landscape paintings, pictured in woodlands, seascapes, meadows and hedgerows as well as vases. How to assemble the perfect palette for flower painting and how to mix vibrant secondary colours, subtle tints and natural greens. The huge range of painting materials available today, from traditional watercolour to vividly coloured wax pastels to innovative textural mediums such as crackle paste and glass bead gel. The secrets of good composition and how to lead the eye around a painting, giving a sense of rhythm and movement while maintaining unity and harmony. Packed with exciting new ideas and illustrated with stunning examples of Soraya’s own work, this book will take your flower painting to a new level and help you find your unique visual voice.

Believe in magic, trust your intuition and find your individual artistic style! In this book, you're the storyteller and the artist and you're on a quest to bring the soulful characters, mythical creatures and magical landscapes of your imagination to life through mixed-media art. You'll tap into your creative voice to fuse together lush dreamscapes, imaginary characters and found objects to build enchanting scenes, whimsical figures and expressive faces out of layers of acrylic, collage, watercolor and more. Learn the techniques necessary to create one-of-a-kind mixed-media masterpieces. On your journey, you'll discover: • Five skills to uncover your unique creative voice. • A magical drawing method. Easily find your characters' bodies and faces hidden in random shapes on painted backgrounds; it's like seeing animals in the clouds. • Imaginative warm-up exercises. Learn tips for creating a character reference library, secrets for drawing unusual faces, how to develop a color palette and advice on how to play with proportion, light and shading. • More than 30 exciting mixed-media projects using watercolor, vintage photographs, gouache, pencil, fabric, ink and much more to bring your imaginary characters to life on everything from woodblocks and paintings to fabric collages and paper dolls. • How to paint without a plan. Trust your intuition to create something out of nothing. • Inspirational quotes about creativity from famous artists and thinkers. Embrace your curiosity and see what happens!

A new kid-friendly tour of art history from the Newbolds In this sequel to the tour de force children’s art-history picture book If Picasso Painted a Snowman, Amy Newbold conveys nineteen artists’ styles in a few deft words, while Greg Newbold’s chameleon-like artistry shows us Edgar Degas’ dinosaur ballerinas, Cassius Coolidge’s dinosaurs playing Go Fish, Hokusai’s dinosaurs surfing a giant wave, and dinosaurs smelling flowers in Mary Cassatt’s garden; grazing in Grandma Moses’ green valley; peeking around Diego Rivera's orchids in Frida Kahlo’s portrait; tiptoeing through Baishi’s inky bamboo; and cavorting, stampeding, or hiding in canvases by Henri Matisse, Andy Warhol, Frida Kahlo, Franz Marc, Harrison Begay, Alma Thomas, Aaron Douglas, Mark Rothko, Lois Mailou Jones, Marguerite Zorach, and Edvard Munch. And, of course, striking a Mona Lisa pose for Leonardo da Vinci. As in If Picasso Painted a Snowman, our guide for this tour is an engaging beret-topped hamster who is joined in the final pages by a tiny dino artist. Thumbnail biographies of the artists identify their iconic works, completing this tour of the creative imagination.

A Celebration of Light Light has the power to make an ordinary flower extraordinary. Inside, Jan Kunz shares simple, step-by-step techniques for capturing that celebrated "glow" in watercolor. A classic approach to a timeless subject, this encore publication of Kunz's best-selling book covers a fabulous range of inspirations, from lilacs artfully arranged in a sterling vase to daisies skipping along a picket fence. Beautifully illustrated pages feature: 20 special floral painting techniques 6 paint-along demonstrations, complete with preliminary drawings a comparison chart of 21 pigments and their special uses for the flower painter coverage of everything from selecting materials and arranging flowers, to mixing glazes for radiant effects Kunz explains how composition, color theory and other important elements of painting apply to painting flowers, distilling years of experience into key techniques artists can take straight to their work for sparkling results. It's the perfect pick for artists who want to spend more time at the easel and less time reading about it.

Join one little girl named Josette as she searches 1920s Paris to find the best artist to paint a portrait of her stuffed-animal rabbit, Pepette. After seeing all the fine portraits of her family in her house in Paris, Josette decides that her stuffed-animal rabbit Pepette needs a portrait of her own. The two of them set off for Montmartre, the art center of 1920s Paris, to seek out an artist to paint Pepette's portrait. They encounter Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dalí, Marc Chagall, and Henri Matisse, who all try their hand at capturing the rabbit. Picasso gives Pepette two noses and three ears-which doesn't sit well with Josette. Dalí gives Pepette very droopy eyes-so Josette says "no thank you" and moves on. Chagall paints Pepette flying through the clouds. Josette points out that Pepette doesn't fly and is afraid of heights-so they decide to keep going through the square. When they meet Matisse, he paints Pepette pink, with lots of colorful dots and splashes covering the canvas. It's a beautiful piece of art, but it's not Pepette. Giving up, Josette and Pepette make their way home. Josette is upset that no one was able to no one was able to capture the true essence of Pepette. Who could capture her soft gray ears, her heart-shaped nose, and all her wonderfulness? And then it comes to her-she, Josette, is the perfect person to do this.