Before departing from Italy, I decided to try to photograph the Tuscan countryside in a non-iconic way to include more landscape and nature rather than tourist sites. My intent was to look toward local color and detail in the country's landscape, including its flora.

This photograph could have been taken anywhere, yet to me; I know it was part of my experience on this trip as I walked around the grounds of our agriturismo, much like at home in New Jersey, where I often find landscape subjects locally (in my backyard so-to-speak).

In taking this picture, I wanted to minimize the focus to the point of one thorn to lend contrast to the softness of the out-of-focus broad leaves of the plant. Fortunately, we had a color contrast as well.