Amy Lincoln’s Gardens are Busy and Vibrant

With spring in full bloom but just outside our reach, we have to resort to more creative ideas. Following New York-based artist, Amy Lincoln, on Instagram might be a good place to start. Known for her vibrant style of painting, her images combine plants with striking landscapes, colored in bright, almost neon, colors.

With color equally important as her subjects themselves (and sometimes even more), it comes as no surprise that color is often the starting point of her pieces. “Usually I see a plant or a few plants that I’m excited by, and I think about how I can plan a composition around it/them,” explained Lincoln in an interview with Maake Magazine. “Usually the color of the plants is a more keyed up version of their natural color. I often come up with sky or background color ideas from something that happened in an earlier painting, some idea that I want to explore further.”

After color comes nature, with her mother’s incredible garden providing an initial source of inspiration. “I think growing up next to a beautiful garden with a mom who was very enthusiastic about plants probably influenced my work,” observed Lincoln. Now a sort of visual gardener herself, Lincoln’s gardens are created using a brush on a paper palette while sticking to a limited color palette. “I usually start with drawings in a sketchbook,” she explains. “Then I make a study for the painting on a small panel or on watercolor paper in acrylic. Sometimes I make more than one study. Usually the final painting is quite similar to the study, with minor changes.”

Her plants often reach from one end of the composition to the other, overlapping and revealing unnaturally vivid skies. “I’m usually inspired by plants I see in person, either that I walk past in my daily life, or I see at a garden, or while on a trip,” says Lincoln. “I look for interesting patterns or plant structure.”

Step right in.

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New study with #daffodils, #crocus and #hyacinth

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