Pansies: My First Digital Print

I have been working so hard the past few days on trying to produce prints of my paintings.  My printer seems to be quite temperamental.  It has moments when it obstinately refuses to do anything. Occasionally, I can be that way too. Stubborn character aside, it is finally producing some very beautiful results.

I wanted to share my first digital print of a painting.  It's a painting that you haven't seen before.  The painting is of a pot of pansies, nemesia, diascia and euphorbia that I had on my back porch a summer ago.   The framed images you see in this post are of the print.  I feel that it looks very similar to my original watercolour image (seen below).

Pansies are one of the most cheerful garden flowers I know and they are a favourite of mine. They belong to the viola family.  I usually grow both pansies and violas. I love how despite their sweet appearance they are one of the hardiest flowers in the garden. They can brave chilly weather, even snow, at the start and end of the gardening season.

They have a really special childhood association for me. I spent most of my childhood in Toronto but we travelled frequently to the western outskirts of Montreal to visit my grandparents.  My mom's dad turned to gardening when he retired and he was a master at it.  He won all sorts of prizes from the local horticultural association for his beautiful roses. I would follow my grandmother around as she fed the birds and squirrels in the backyard and tended to the annuals. One of my favourite memories is of her letting me pick pansies from the garden to put in the beautiful silver and glass posy vase she owned.  

My grandmother and I were very close and I was very sad when she died.  I was twenty years old at the time. The memory of gathering pansies with her was so special to me that I tracked down an almost identical vase for myself years later from an antique dealer.

And, oh yes, one more thing.  My grandmother's name was Viola.

*  *  *  *  *

GIVEAWAY

To celebrate my progress and the production of my first print, I am going to give away one unframed Pansies print to one of my blog readers.  

All you need to do is add a comment on this post before midnight (Eastern time) this Friday, October 7th.  Please make sure that I have a link or your email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner.  I will post the name of the winner on Saturday afternoon.

Here's a little information for those of you who like to know about the technical side of things.  The image measures about 5½ inches across and 4¼ inches down.  It fits perfectly in a Ikea Ribba frame (in photo) or any frame with a 5 x 7 inch opening. The paper itself measures 8 x 10 inches. The print is on very beautiful cold press, natural white archival paper that is made in Italy. It has the feel, weight and look of watercolour paper. It is 100% cotton fiber and is acid and lignin free. It is printed with Epson Ultrachrome inks and a whole lot of love.