Today’s watercolor experiment:

I felt really bad that I didn’t take care of my fuzzy, thick-leaved plant, the subject of one of my watercolor studies a day or so ago. Whilst doing errands therefore, I picked up a grove (?), orchard (?), gaggle (?) of new succulents. (Forgive, me but I do not know the proper collective plural for a small gathering of succulent plants.)

Today’s composition features Aeonium Species, the name proclaimed on the label of the plastic pot in which the plant resided.

It is a smallish plant. I believe I have seen mature plants of this type that have grown tall and stalky. Hopefully my new one will do the same. I should give it a name. After all, Arthur, my pet avocado tree that I grew from a seed has one.

Aeonium
6″x4″ 140# Cold Pressed Watercolor Block

I like the symmetry of the petals. It is not as tight a form as say, a sunflower, but rather suggestive of a spiral pattern. Perhaps with more growth more spirality will be revealed.

The colors presented a challenge. The purple outer leaves (are they still petals?) remain purple along their entire length. However, the inner leaves begin as yellow-green in the region closest to the hub, and turn to purple further to the periphery. This was a hard transition for me to portray.

All in all, I like this composition. The ink lines helped to provide contrast among the leaves.