As promised, today’s fruit is papaya. I never realized that a papaya had so many seeds. I imagine it is in the melon family, because the inside is arranged just like a cantaloupe’s insides. It also smells funky. Nothing I can put my finger on, but the first image that came to my mind (or my nose, to be precise) was, ‘old socks’.

Today’s experiment

I sketched the first image to give an idea of the scale of the papaya.

It is enormous. That’s probably why the sell them by the pound.

Inside the papaya

The inside of the papaya is really interesting. The brown seeds look like fish eggs. There are quite a number of them as well, but they are arranged neatly, dangling from the inside by some kind of connective tissue – maybe papaya seedling umbilical cords…

The study below is the cross section of the papaya, with my old friends, the apple and the guava. That’s right, the same ones that I have been painting for the past couple of days. Maybe I should get some new ones, or else be prepared to alter my palette to capture the colors of decay.

As far as critical analysis of the sketch, let me just say that I think I have all the elements and I just have to keep practicing. Not that practice is a chore, I enjoy each watercolor sketch I attempt. I would like the finished image to resemble more of what my mind’s eye envisions, however.

Thank you Liz and Woman Unadorned for your dragon fruit suggestions.  I’ll be on the lookout for them.