About a year or so ago, I began to paint with watercolor at the home of my friend Violet. I started with whatever was in front of me on the Formica table–usually a piece of aging fruit. Never a fan of doing still life (I like action! gesture!) I decided to view it as a challenge rather than a bore. Soon I realized that I wasn’t really painting fruit or vegetables, I was just focusing on the color, form, and detail in front of me. And such glorious detail–bruises, dings, decay! After letting the wet-on-wet color settle and dry where it wanted to (with a little help from me), I went in with a smaller brush and meditated on the beauty of imperfection. And aging. At this time in my life, the metaphor is too apt. Recently, I was helping a local landscape artist with her autumn pruning. She pointed to her apple tree and encouraged me to help myself, that they made good apple sauce. I knocked some down and thought, now I know what a real apple looks like. Each one was unique, misshapen to some aesthetics, but charming and unapologetic, and begging for a portrait. So I did, with each and every one. 
Next I polished them off.
CHEERS!
Dirndl Skirt Gatherings 
Fantastic!
As I read downward through your teasing vertical presentation, where you describe and show the process, I am smiling because I see this whole presentation as the bigger piece of art. Metaphor or not, the bruises have never been so completely engaging.
Wow!
Gary~Thanks for your “wow” and for getting the bigger picture. Should I have ended with spiked hot cider?
This was good and I like the apple paintings. I grew up with apple trees but never painted an apple. I did paint the tree though. Keep painting!
What!? You have to paint an apple!
Beautiful!! Now you have to paint those beets too. There’s something so wonderful about eating what you studied and rendered–total consumption.
I save my avocado pits in a bowl under the sink, and one summer, drew every pit I’d collected…there were 61 of them!
So great to see you here! I actually have painted the beets 🙂
http://sharonwattscreative.com/category/watercolor/
But 61 avocado pits? You are the zen master!
Those are gorgeous beets!! Look at those little hairy roots. So nice. We made paper in one of my Haystack workshops with beets. You could paint beets on beets.
It is so nice to see your work again!