Vegetable Explosion
It’s the season of abundance! Farm stands, farmers markets, and gardens are at their peak– full of rich color, variety, and freshness the likes of which no supermarket can match. It’s time to celebrate! Pick your favorite vegetable and you are likely to find it feted somewhere: there are OkraFests, GarlicFests, Potato Festivals, even a Butterbean Festival in Alabama, a Great Northern Squashfest in Wisconsin, and an Eggplant Festival in California—every veggie, it seems, gets its due. My personal favorite was a family celebration held each August called Corn Sunday, a gathering of my distant cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents where everyone rolled corn-on-the-cob in mounds of butter and ate as many ears as they liked, along with an unhealthy helping of corn chips, hot dogs, hamburgers, and my Great Aunt Rose’s baked beans. This page celebrates the season with produce from my garden and local farm stands. Enjoy!
Tips and Techniques– Keep your colors fresh! I painted this mainly by mixing just three primary colors: ultramarine blue, nickel azo yellow, and alizarin crimson. I also needed a warmer red for the tomatoes and used quin magenta, which mixed well with the yellow. Using bright primary colors will give you a full range of hues and values. Cleaning your palette and brushes frequently and changing your water when its murky will also keep your colors from getting muddy.
CHECK IT OUT: I’ve added a new lineup of workshops for the fall.
Drawn In 
Jean, your zucchini is perfection! Since I’ve discovered the pigment matters more than the name, may I ask what brand of quin magenta you use? Daniel Smith and Winsor Newton use different ones, and I think those are the brands you usually use. Thanks!
Hi Dory- I use Qor from Golden Artist Colors. They have a “high chroma” set that I bought to try that included the nickel axon yellow and quin magenta. This brand remoistens very nicely.
Your vegetables are gorgeous Jean! I’m amazed at the range of colors you achieved with only four pigments. Did you also use Qor’s Alizarin Crimson?
Hi Jill– I am not at home this weekend, so I’m not sure, but I think so. Qor is based in New York State and I like supporting a local manufacturer. Plus– the paints are great. I do use other brands for a few things– Daniel Smith sap green and Winsor & Newton burnt sienna. I have tubes of paint that I bought before discovering Qor, so I still use them, but I like the way the Qor paints settle in the pans and rewet when I’m ready to use them.
A post as beautiful and vibrant as the taste of all these veggies- I’m off to the farm stand now!
Hope you bought some beautiful treasures!
I too miss corn Sunday …. Great memories… Cousin David
What’s not to miss! It was a classic holiday!
I really enjoy your blog.thank you.
Thanks Bernadette. Thanks for following!
Awesome and delicious all at once! What a bounty. My personal favorites are the exquisite eggplant (such spectacular purples) and that perfect-for-bread zucchini (love your textures and shading). What combo did yiu use for the eggplant purples? Your tips and techniques are great (always). You have an amazing ability to make your advice sound exciting!
Thanks Barb. I used ultramarine and alizarin crimson for the eggplant and you can see the range of light to dark I got. I did add a layer of cobalt blue to the one on the left and a layer of indanthrone blue with a touch of alizarin to the largest eggplant, but the all started the same way– a loose wash of ultramarine and alizarin.
Thanks Jean!
Gorgeous. Thanks for the tips on keeping the colours fresh and bright.
Great– glad the tips are helpful!
Beautiful bounty! I can barely cook properly at this time of year, I stop to sketch and everything is messed up!! 😂
I have to label what’s for eating and what’s for painting!
These are really beautiful! I love your art and your attitude!
Thank you Nan!