A Lesson in Color

There is a painting hanging in our bedroom, it's been there since Spring of 2010.  I have looked at that painting almost everyday since then and liked it sorta, nothing wrong with it technically, I framed it in a wooden shadow box, BUT I just couldn't "love" the overall piece.  I named it "Complementary Flowers" because the dominant colors were orange and blue.

I have been mulling over this work all this time and recently, I had an aha moment about the colors.  My gut was telling me cool this painting down, and the painterly part of my gut said change the background to a cool leaving small outlines of the orange at a ratio of about 15% warm to 85% cool. 

So I took the canvas out of the frame and went to work on the background colors. 

Now I absolutely love this painting.  The images here don't do the original justice, there's a lot of orange coming through the blues and I left outlines of orange around the flowers and leaves so that the painting is unified in complements all over the place.  I also darkened the bottom of the piece anchoring it a little more than it was when it was predominantly warm.

Yay!  It's back in it's frame and hanging in our room.  Now I absolutely love it.