Eva Burke "Baseline Painting"
Acrylic, 2025
I wanted to paint something floral, so I decided on a painting of flowers in a vase, something I had been drawing absentmindedly on things in my free time. I started with the background, and making the outline for the window. I then began the vase and the flowers. I made the window and finished the painting by putting a little bit of paint and water on a paper towel and dragging it out over the painting away from the window, starting at the sun. it was supposed to look like sunlight. My goal with this painting was to make it look like a still scene where everything is going right. The sun should make it look as though it is a happy bit, maybe even taking out a bit of sadness since the background is blue. I was struggling to get the flowers to look right, especially the dead one, and had to go over it multiple times. It was going for a realistic painting though it didn’t quite achieve that.
Eva Burke "Finish line Painting"
Acrylic, 2025
The goal for this painting was to redo and make better my original baseline painting. It was a nice looking painting, I knew I could do so much better, and so I remade it, tweaking things to add more detail or to have better realism. I started with a sketch. From there I painted the background, which was blue and the table. I lightened the colors and made a streak for the light coming from the window. The table got a wood color. I then made the background in the window, which I made smaller to make the main focus more on the flowers and less on the window. I then made the window frame and the vase, adding detail making wood grain on the window and shadows on the vase. Finally, came the flowers, which were difficult to get the lighting to pass through, but they look great, and have more detail than the original, which took a lot of taping for some of them. The work is supposed to look like a pretty scene where it makes you feel happy, like everything is going right. There is only one dead flower, but it is augmenting the look, not pulling it down. It is just making things better, and the light and background in the window just make things peaceful and serene. Getting everything to have the light on it was the most difficult. I would probably have made sure to make enough of the colors in order to get enough of the light, since I had to make it multiple times in different places. This is semirealism, as are most of my paintings. The painting looks real enough that you can see the scene without having other techniques to make it being used, but it is not real enough that it looks like you could see it really being a place. This is the style most of my paintings are in, since I have not yet achieved the ability to make realistic paintings. I do love how the flowers look so much more realistic and the light is less harsh.
Eva Burke "Pink Valley of the Mountains"
9’ - 12’, Acrylic, 2025
My painting is a painting of mountains with pink flowers in bloom in front of it, with a single pink tree, also in bloom. I was looking through photos online, looking for something to sketch on a free website. I saw this beautiful picture of a mountain with pink flowers, and it made me smile. Whenever we go to my grandparents on my mother’s side, we go through the North Carolinian mountains, and I can often see them in the distance while we drive through them. While the picture wasn’t of those mountains, it gave me a similar feeling of serenity. I started the painting with just a plain
blue acrylic, and then painted a straight line of green. From there the mountains formed, and then the clouds, the grass, the flowers and the tree. The sky was given different hues. I used a fan brush to make the grass, sometimes pulling the color over new flowers. The flowers themselves were many tiny dots throughout with many different colors. Some of the darker rocks that are visible on the mountains were muted a little bit by very watered down white, that went over it but didn’t completely cover it. Some more dark was put over it so they looked different despite being the same hue. This artwork reminds me of my grandparents and how nice it is in North Carolina when we visit them. It is supposed to bring peace, and a sort of serenity to those looking at it. There's supposed to be a calm peace to this color. It’s a reminder that there is more than just the grey of the city and factories and machines. Some of the most beautiful colors exist in nature. The color itself is symbolic, because some of the bright color is exaggerated from the original image, like the darker purple of the shadow on the snow. It’s supposed to make just a happier place. It was really difficult to find the right color and way to paint on the snow for the mountain. I painted over the middle mountain so many times trying to get the angle of the snow and where it changed right. Eventually I got it, but it took a lot of experimenting and starting over. If I completely started over, I would make the small purple hill on the right and add more detail, something I missed while adding more color. This painting was going for a realistic look, though it didn’t quite achieve that. You can tell hat it is, and the details are many. However, it does look like most of the realistic painting I make. It doesn’t quite get there, but you see it as somewhere you would like to go just the same. It blends some of the worse features of the place and makes it seem, less real and more pretty. I love the way the tree turned out. I was worried at first that it was going to get lost in the chaos of everything else, but when I look at the painting it is one of the first things that get my attention. You can still see the mountain through it, and I really like that. It doesn’t stand out too much while still drawing in the eye.
Before
In progress 1
In progress 2
After
10’ - 14’, Acrylic, 2025
I wanted to make a painting of one of my pets. My original idea was to paint my cat, because she does the most random things that would make a good photo. However, my dog who was sitting next to me looked especially cute, like he was posing, so I took a photo of it, and that evolved into my painting. I liked the idea of having a painting of one of my pets since one of my cats died recently. The other cat we have was his sister, and when he died it really showed her age. My dog is not nearly as old, but the thought of having a painting of him, especially when he was younger, made me happy. I started with a background color, and then got some paint in for the right half. It put a little bit of detail and a basic layout. I threw down a little bit of black paint where my dog would be, so that I could get an idea of the layout, but it wasn’t permanent. I went from there, adding more to the background and the dog. Some techniques I used were tapping, a lot actually, for detail in the carpet and couch. I also would put down some just black paint and grab another color with the brush and mix on the canvas, so that it would look more like fur. This artwork is supposed to be a captured moment of my dog choosing to be in the middle of everything and everyone. It just is a reminder of how funny it can be for a dog to be a dog. He was sitting in front of the couch in just the right place to be inconvenient to walk past or get off of the couch, which both my mom and sister were sitting on. It is supposed to just make you smile, make you happy because of the dog. The use of warm colors should help with that. It was difficult to get the balance of colors right, otherwise the dog would look more like a blob. I had to get all the angles right, like the way I was brushing,and to make sure I added enough colors to let texture show without making him look like he isn’t black, which he is. This is supposed to be a semi-realistic painting. The idea for the style was to capture the look of the dog with detail, but to also add some colors and things to make it pop. IMy own style is semi realistic where you get the concept and the detail, but it doesn't look enough like it’s real, but like it’s real enough that you can see it being a real subject. I absolutely love the way the couch blends in. It doesn't merge too much with his brown fur, but it still looks brown in similar shades. It also does look like a couch, something I was worried about because of a close up. I love the detail in it as well, it just looks like something that has the right amount of detail white not being the center of attention.