A White Poinsettia

At our last watercolor class for the season, we painted a red poinsettia Christmas Card. While I was giving the preliminary instructions, one of my students asked what you should do if you wanted to paint a white poinsettia. While they were working along on their red flowers, I decided to paint my sample with a white flower.

You might remember from previous discussions that white is not white. In order to give a white object form and dimension, you must use color. Also, the original design for this card had no background. It did not need one. However, a white poinsettia on white paper will disappear, so I added a background.

You can see that the colors I used on this piece were Ultramarine Blue, Violet, and Gamboge. The leaves were developed with Sap Green and tints of the other colors were added. There is no doubt that this poinsettia is white. But just look at how colorful it is!