Patchwork painted leaf

Another leaf. After the success of the first leaf, I decided to have a go at painting another of the pressed leaves in my stash. This time I changed up the style, dividing the leaf into blocks and choosing some brighter colours. I had a vague memory of there being a rule about the minimum number of colours required to shade a map; a quick search turned up the Four Colour Theorem and so I picked out four of the Stuart Semple potions.

For things like this, I have to plan them out on paper. In theory, I could have just started drawing straight lines onto the leaf, but I was much happier sketching it out first. Then I could transfer the design to the leaf using a black Posca pen (which I also used to tidy up the lines again after painting the individual blocks).

I wanted to add a little something extra, so I broke out the Prysm for the first time and created a variety of shiny circles over the top.

Once the leaf was finished, I decided to mount it on a sheet of handmade paper; it was becoming a bit fragile around the tips and wouldn’t have survived otherwise. Rather than leave the background blank, I went against all my instincts for subtlety and brushed it with bright green, toning it down with black Indian ink splatters.

This is one of those pieces that was fun to make, giving me a chance to experiment with a different style while also testing out a product that I hadn’t used before.