When Colour Turns Botanical Forms Into Energy
In my artwork, botanicals don’t exist as gentle illustrations of nature. They behave like charged organisms — forms lit from within, vibrating with emotion and surreal presence. Acid greens and vivid blues are central to this transformation. These colours are not meant to be realistic. They create a world where plants feel alive in a way that borders on supernatural, where petals glow, stems pulse, and botanical forms carry a tension that pulls the viewer deeper into the scene.
Acid Green as Emotional Voltage
Acid green is a colour that refuses to stay still. It flickers, bites, vibrates. When I paint petals or stems in this hue, they take on an electric quality — a sense of movement even in absolute stillness. Acid green suggests emotional voltage: an inner charge, a restless energy, a feeling that something is humming beneath the surface. It makes the botanical elements feel alert and sentient, as though they’re responding to an unseen force or listening to the emotional tone of the figure nearby.
Vivid Blue as Cold Light and Surreal Luminosity
Blue in its vivid, unnatural form brings a completely different kind of intensity. It functions like cold light — crisp, sharp, and strangely serene. When vivid blue appears in petals, backgrounds, or facial shading, it acts as a countercurrent to the heat of the greens and reds. The blue cools the composition, but also makes it feel otherworldly. It introduces emotional depth by creating the sensation of a world where light behaves differently, where colour defines mood more than realism ever could.
The Tension Between Green and Blue
Placed together, acid green and vivid blue create a precise emotional tension — a visual pull that feels both harmonious and contradictory. The green vibrates outward, while the blue pulls inward. One is restless, the other still. This tension mirrors the emotional states within my portraits: sensitivity balanced with sharpness, softness paired with unease, a sense of being both alive and suspended. The botanicals become emotional mediators, holding these contradictory energies in a single image.
Colour as a Catalyst for Surreal Life
The more electric the palette, the more animated the botanicals become. Acid green makes them flutter emotionally; vivid blue gives them the depth of dream-water or the glow of moonlit glass. Neither colour behaves naturally, and that’s the point. Surreal botanicals thrive on imbalance. They grow in colours that should not exist, and because they shouldn’t exist, they feel even more alive. The intensity becomes a form of personality — a shift from decoration to presence.
When Botanicals Echo the Figure’s Emotional State
In many of my artworks, the greens and blues surrounding the figure are not separate from them. They mirror mood. A luminous blue petal may reflect introspection or quiet melancholy. A flash of acid green in a stem might echo tension, alertness, or inner friction. The botanicals behave like emotional companions — extensions of the figure’s psychological landscape. They’re not passive floral motifs; they are active participants in the emotional atmosphere.
Why Electric Botanicals Feel So Alive
Electric colour makes the botanical world feel charged, trembling, and awake. It removes the safety associated with soft florals and replaces it with vibrancy, surreal tension, and emotional intensity. The flowers don’t soothe; they provoke curiosity. They create a sense of life that is heightened, hyper-real, and dream-strange.
Through acid greens and vivid blues, my botanicals inhabit a world where beauty isn’t calm but electric — a world where nature itself pulses with feeling, colour becomes energy, and the surreal becomes a living breath.
