Influences

Water Lilies at Lobster Cove

Sometimes a painter will "own" a subject.  Every time I paint a sailboat, I am coming up against the work of Winslow Homer.  And yesterday I decided to paint the water lilies at the end of Lobster Cove which put me in competition with Claude Monet.  

The solution is to know your style and your own procedure so that the result will be consistent with your own style and technique.  First of all, I used my own medium.  Monet painted his water lilies in oil; I used my medium of choice: watercolor.  

Also, the  use of watercolor makes possible the wet-in-wet charging of colors and blending of colors at the edges of shapes in a way that isn't as easy with oils.

I painted around the blooms of the lilies and then painted in the pink blossoms.  To get that pink, I used a bit of Chinese white mixed with alizarin.  The pink contrasts nicely with the complementary color of green. 

The dark reflections also helped focus attention on the lighter blooms.  I had to paint fast so as to avoid hard edges and oozles.  Pre-wetting the area helped keep the area fresh so I could freely dash in the dark tones.  I also kept the number of lilies to a minimum to allow the dark shapes of the reflections to stand out.  For that reason also, I confined the blooms to the edge of the dark shape and mostly to the foreground. 

In conclusion, You can take inspiration from the subject matter of artists who came before you.  Just make sure you are true to your own vision of that subject.