Painting plant roots in watercolor: Rooting Spider Plant

Susan Avis Murphy    Rooting Spider Plant    image 10x14"

What houseplant can be propagated faster by rooting than the spider plant?!  I had a little spider plant offshoot that was wanting to grow roots, so I stuck it in a small glass vase and three weeks later I had a profusion of beautiful roots for still life painting!  Here is my original photo for this painting.  The spider plantlet was placed on a black fleece blanket on top of a table in bright indirect light.  I used the dark gray background in order to bring out the brightness of the greens and any subtle colors, like pinks, among the roots.

Spider Plant Roots original photo

Step 1.  I created an 8.5x11" black and white template on plain copy paper, and traced the image using Saral graphite transfer paper onto a quarter sheet of Arches 140 lb cold-pressed paper.

Spider Plant step 1

Step 2.  I masked only the brightest white spots with Daler-Rowney masking fluid, using my 50% ammonia trick to keep the brush from getting gummed up.  I will tell you more about my discovery concerning masking fluid in the next post...

Spider Plant step 2

Step 3.  Next I propped the painting about 2" high using a box of waxed paper, and I mixed up a large puddle of ultramarine blue with Hansa yellow and brown madder. My intention was to create an interesting granulating gray color.  I painted the entire background in one large wash, keeping the paper quite wet so that backruns would not form.  By propping up the board and always working off the bead of water at the bottom of the wash, you can keep the wash from forming back-runs.  Do not go back up and touch with water any parts near the upper half that are beginning to dry...

Spider Plant step 3

Step 4.  The background wash came out bluer than I had intended.  I will be going over the entire background again later.  Meanwhile, I started painting the leaves and colors in the water-filled vase.  I exaggerated a little any colors that I saw there (look back at the reference photo).  This is an exercise in negative painting since the roots are not masked out.

Spider Plant step 4

Step 4.  I continued with the leaves, making them bright and a yellow-green color so that they would be as bright as possible.  I washed in some yellow and ivory color for the roots, with a tinge of pink; painted more of the water (fairly dark since refraction is intensifying the color).  I started darkening the whole background with another wash of the same mixture, this time with more brown madder in it.  Since it would be hard to do that entire wash at one time, I stopped at the bottom and added some water to create a soft edge.  I can pick up there again later...

Spider Plant step 5

Step 6.  Here I have painted more of the roots.  First, though, I masked the smallest root hairs so that they would stand out against the thicker roots (could have done this in the beginning).  See the detail right below.  Also you can click on one image and they will all open up larger in another window.

Spider Plant step 6

Spider Plant step 6 close-up

Step 7.  Here I have added more darks and negative painting among the roots.  Also I have added two dark shadows on the right, representing rolls in the blanket.

Spider Plant step 7

Step 8.  And now I have added a few more details among the roots and leaves.  Also I used a stencil brush to lift out the bright little spot of light on the blanket.  Plus I glazed the large open space on the right with a watery mixture of blue to suggest more about the roll in the blanket.

Spider Plant step 8

Step 9.  I have been bothered a bit by the shape of the dark shadow in the back, so I decided to alter it.  I used a large soft stencil brush to lift some of the paint under the leaves on the right, and re-orient the shadow so it looks more diagonal.  Also I lifted off the diagonal shape in the upper right edge and will paint it brown.  I also have been bothered by the large boring gray space under the leaves, and decided to add another element to the picture, namely a baby spider plant branching off (the suggestion of my student, Betsy Thomas!).  I can add anything I want, because all my paint is of the "liftable" variety--i.e., I do not use staining colors.  More in the next step...

Spider Plant step 9

Step 10.  To find a little reference photo for my baby spider plant, I Googled "spider plant images" and came up with hundreds of photos!  I choose a good one just to look at a little as a reference.  First I had to remove the gray paint.  So I drew in my baby plant with pencil, then surrounded it with 3M drafting tape to mask the edges, and lifted off the paint with a small stencil brush.  It took a while.

Spider Plant step 10

 Step 11.  After the new cleared area was dry, it was quite simple to paint in my baby spider plant.  I also worked on the water drops and reflections of the window panes that are in the vase.   Here is the final painting.  Voila!  Feel free to tell me what you think by commenting on the blog.  Next posting will be about the painting of the "Rooting Tulip Bulbs"!

Susan Avis Murphy    Rooting Spider Plant     10x14"