Potted Plant in the Searing Heat

I dug out this picture from some time ago - It was one of my first attempts with using value and shadow. This potted plant was on a concrete patio on a day that was over 30 degrees. The colour scheme is intended to capture the feeling of the sweltering heat. I think that the shadows on the right hand side of the page are fairly successful. I had read in a book that using a pure grey or black deadens the feel of the painting, so using the violet kept it lively.

However, I fell into the trap of trying to make it look too realistic instead of painting with some emotion. You can see this with the attempt to paint fine lines on the clay pot, which gives it an amateurish look. Perhaps the fact that I was painting from a photograph led to that mistake.