With all the roses in the garden, it was only a mater of minutes before I succumbed to the urge of painting one of them. I chose ‘Odyssey’, a pale lilac open rose with large blooms and lovely perfume.
In order to keep the yellow and crimson stamen fresh and vivid, I decided to use masking fluid to mask them while painting the petals. I used a small brush in order to keep the filaments slender enough. I like blue masking fluid because I can see it well and when something is as confusing as a bunch of stamen, nobody needs to add the “I can’t see where I’ve painted my masking fluid” type of confusion. I went to have lunch while the fluid was drying and getting ready for a layer of paint on the petals around them.
Once the petals where painted, I waited until the following day and then started removing the masking fluid in sections with a rubber, painting the cleaned up areas before moving on to the next section.
Thanks to the masking fluid keeping the paper crisp and white, the stamen look bright even on top of the petals’ grey shadows.
Here is a video of the whole process:
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And here are links to the materials I used:
Brush for the masking fluid (Da vinci Nova synthetic size 0)
Brush for the painting (Prolene + series 007)
Happy painting!
Sandrine Maugy 