Sister Magnolia #1

My Sister Magnolia paintings began as a gift for my mother-in-law. Over the years, she has shared examples of botanical art with muted tones and decorative patterns she liked. While these didn't exactly align with my usual practice, they helped inform me of her tastes. During a visit to her new home in South Carolina, I saw these magnolias blooming at her sister's house and quickly caught a few photos. It occurred to me that it might be meaningful to paint two—gifting one to each sister to celebrate their bond and their coming together.

Though given as a surprise, I treated the project like a commission, balancing her preferences with my distinct style. These paintings are smaller than my typical work but more dense and complex in their shapes. Both pieces share an abstracted approach to the negative space, shifting the palette slightly blue to imply air between the viewer and the distance. It is difficult to imply depth of field—that atmospheric perspective—when my process relies entirely on crisp, hard edges and solid color fields, so achieving this "blurry" effect required very intentional choices in color and shape to create visual separation.

What stands out about this piece is its direct, symmetrical composition. It radiates evenly from a central axis, continually pulling the viewer back to that potent hit of crimson and textured yellow in the center. The background leaves extend outward from the central flower, providing further emphasis on the flower's triumphant emergence.