Mandarines by Elena Bazanova in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Do you smell that? That’s the smell of my jealousy. This piece by Bazanova is genius. Of course the inside of a mandarine is white and, by its very nature, lends itself to being painted with watercolors. Of course!
You see, Bazanova knows that the watercolor painting process is all about going from light to dark. The inside of the mandarines are, of course, white with a bit of orange. Take a close look at the piece. Look closely at the orange edge of each wedge of the mandarine. When broken down each wedge is simple and only contains a few brush strokes and some shading. Brilliant.
This is a great example of what I wrote earlier about taking something that may seem mundane – like a few pieces of fruit – and making something great. Like this painting.
Bazanova’s expertise in fruit doesn’t stop at these mandarines. Take a few moments to drool over her Flickr stream for a few hours like I just did.