The Dark Rose of Summer

I tend to paint light; when I look at the work of some of the painters who went to the same art school as me at roughly the same time, it seems that their work tends toward the lighter side of the value chart, too. It might be that our instructors were still under the influence of the Impressionists (as far as realist painting went) and they told us not to use black in our palettes. I think we all overcompensated by using lots of white in our mixtures. Anyway, I darkened the rose today. Maybe too it reflects my current mood.

The Last Rose of Summer, © 2016, work in progress (click on image for larger view)