I decided that I would start every day with a pencil and wash drawing of some vegetable(s). The first day, I went to the fridge and took out three out of the four vegetables that are cooked every day (the fourth being onions): ginger, green chillies and tomatoes. Some small eggplants were lying in the bin, so I added one of those as well.
I started with the ginger, and tried to pay very close attention to all of its knobs and ridges. I was pretty happy with it.
Then the chillie. It was harder, because it had fewer features, and I had a difficult time making the colours intense enough. I started with an underglaze of yellow, but after several washes of greens, trying to get the colours right, I lost the yellow, so had to go back and add it again. Then I lost the highlight... sigh.
The tomatoes were even tougher, especially the one on the left - did you know that that was meant to be a tomato? No particular features, and that incredible red/ orange...
Finally the little eggplant, which was more satisfactory.
Drawing and painting these vegetables was so intense and satisfying! I got into that wordless mode where one is very focussed on what one is doing, and was very sorry when I fell out of it again, into the noisy world.
