Floral portraits

This time of year is a joy with floral wonderfulness bursting into the garden. Tulips are a favourite along with daffs and bundles of blossom. And every year on sunny days (I am a bit of a fair weather photographer, well everything looks so much better bathed in sunshine doesn't it?) I rush outside, armed with my trusty Canon and get up close and personal with a whole variety of petals and stamens, leaves and stems.

Georgia O'Keefe, painter of large canvasses depicting huge close ups of flowers, had several things to say about  her choice of subject, things which I agree with wholeheartedly:

'I decided that if I could paint that flower in a huge scale, you could not ignore its beauty'

'When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it's your world for the moment. I want to give that world to someone else. Most people in the city rush around so, they have no time to look at a flower. I want them to see it whether they want to or not.'

'Nobody sees a flower really; it is so small. We haven't time, and to see takes time - like to have a friend takes time.'

She also said, which I find remarkable as her flower paintings are so full of energy and vibrant,

'I hate flowers - I paint them because they're cheaper than models and they don't move',  

So here are some of my floral portraits, if they were ever shown in an exhibition I would like them to be either very small, like Kodachrome transparencies and mounted in black frames that obscured the light boxes that would illuminate them, like tiny stained glass windows, or precious jewels. OR printed up huge, a la O'Keefe so that when you stand in front them they envelope you. I find the whole scale question fascinating.