Often when you paint your love of painting shines through. I am so happy with the feeling I captured with this painting – it feels happy and joyful to me.
It feels like joy
Yesterday, I completed this painting. I felt so happy when I looked up from my palette and realized there was nowhere left to put paint. I stood back to look at it and smiled and signed it. I am so happy with the feeling I captured with with this piece – it feels happy and joyful to me.
Within minutes of signing it, I had a friend visit my studio. This painting captured her attention. She kept looking at the painting and said to me that she feels joy when she looks at it. It feels like joy! And how happy that made me. Ya done a good job there Helen!
Then we talked about how elusive joy can be and that while we often feel happy and content – joy if often fleeting or evasive.
Colours of Ode to Joy
From this conversation I knew in naming this piece that Joy would be in the title. My mind kept going to Ode to Joy and so with the help of my friend Google this is what I found:
It’s a tune about peace: Ode to Joy represents the triumph of universal brotherhood against war and desperation.
>
“Indeed, Beethoven himself put to music a poem that praises and wishes for freedom and peace between all peoples.”
With great pathos, the ode describes the typically romantic ideal of a society of men equally bound together by bonds of joy and universal friendship. This concept is experienced as a true “return” to the divine dimension of the human being, idealized in Ancient Greece.
Quite apropos for our times! And sunflowers are the perfect flower to illustrate all this as it is the official flower of the Ukraine.
False start
I originally started this painting before our world went sideways. Before we understood the significance of the sunflower other than it’s beauty. You may recall the painting I tossed into in the firepit for using the wrong pigment? That story is here. I couldn’t wait to get started on it once again.
Thinking of prints
I been asked if I was planning on donating the proceeds of this painting to a cause for the Ukraine. Since I started this painting long before the war, it wasn’t my plan. Rather I’m planning to produce a number of limited edition prints and donating the proceeds to the cause.
Let me know if you would be interested in purchasing a print of these beautiful sunflowers!
Cheers
It’s beautiful and truly joyful!
thank you – it made me happy to paint it
Beautiful painting. Sunflowers are my favourite!
Thank you so much – they are a joyful flower for sure