Rose Hips

In response to the title 'Leaves and Berries' I opted for the remains of some rose hips in the garden.

I started by applying a multi-coloured wash to a sheet of 'Cornwall' matt paper.
I wet some parts of the paper with a brush and the central part, I wet using a laundry spray.
The spray has the advantage of giving a textured look to the background as the paint runs along the linked spots of water.

You can see this lovely passage below the deepest area of Quinachridone Coral. I also used Teal Blue, Indigo, Sap Green, Translucent Orange and Quinachridone Rust.
I let the paint dry completely and then added a faint pencil drawing of the rose hips.I was careful to keep the central textured area as free from hips as possible as I really liked this part of the background.

I painted the hips, created some leaf shapes and added some twiggy forms for the stems. I kept the stems as natural as possible by blowing a small puddle of paint across the paper to give them natural shapes
I tried to vary the colour of the hips as much as possible, and left some only partially painted into the background.I erased any remaining visible pencil lines.

When all the hips were painted, I felt that the bottom three were in too much of a straight line, so I added a couple more to hopefully improve the composition.
I darkened the top LH corner and added to the bramble bits at the top. I decided that this was the point to stop. It is too easy to work dark areas into reds and get them 'dirty'. Even now it is not as fresh as I would have liked it, but I think it will do!