Tonight, Tonight

I promise I am still here, and I am still crafting.  Still taking pictures and making jewelry.  Just not making much time for blogging.  I know, no fun, right?  I just can't seem to find the focus to write.  

Here is a piece I have been working on for our bedroom.  I love The Smashing Pumpkins, and "Tonight, Tonight" is one of my favorite songs they have done.  I thought it would work well above our bed.  

I started with the picture above, which is a piece of old decor from a Subway store.  My mom had it in her yard and I asked for it.  It is huge and I thought it would be fun to paint over.  I took the frame off and put a coat of gesso over the picture  (which is two sheets of plastic with foam in the middle) and added texture with Liquitex Basics modeling paste.   Since I am not selling the piece I just used Apple Barrel and Fold Art fabric paints.  I printed the words out and projected them up with my Art Tracer Jr Projector and penciled them in.  

Here's the finished painting.  I am quite happy with it, and can't wait to get it up on the wall.  First I need to paint some shutters that I will used as a headboard.  

Hubby picked the font out.  I really like it!

Skull and Sparrows - New Painting

A friend of mine requested an original painting.  She wanted a Day of the Dead inspired painting that combined a sugar skull, sparrows, daisies, swirls, and rainbow colors.  I did a bit of research and here is the thumbnail sketch I came up with.

This painting took me forever to do.  I experimented with a few different techniques, and they took me a long time to figure out.  First I worked on my backgound layers, a step that I had previously not put much effort into.  I was inspired by a video by Regina Lord of Creative Kismet.  You can view the video here.  I collaged layers of sketchbook paper with gel medium, coated them with a light brushing of gesso, then added some yellow with watercolor crayon.  I wish I had taken of photo of this step, but I did not.

Next I did an underpainting in white.  I have never done this, but after seeing this underpainting by David Lozeau I decided to give it a try.  You'll notice his is much, much, much more detailed than mine.   It was more work, but I like how it brightened all of the colors in my final layer.  Here's the underpainting.

Next I did a sketch in pencil over the underpainting to use as a guide.  This is usually where I start, then I do detail work, then try to paint the background in.  You can imagine that this really limited the amount of detail I was able to include in my background.  I much prefer this newer method.

Once the sketch was down, I began painting.  I also had two lovely birdies to paint.  These were thrifted vintage, and I believe they were from Homco circa 1970-something.  They were golden, so I added layer of gesso and painted the the same colors as the sparrows in the painting.  Here's the end result.

I learned a lot with this piece, but most of all I learned that acrylic is a labor of love.  I think my next project may be watercolor, or maybe just a simple ink drawing.  I need a break!  Hey, let me whine just a little bit.  I am 11 weeks pregnant and exhausted.

New Painting

No posts since February?  That's horrible isn't it?  Well I have been very busy though and have lots to share with you.  I am in the process of decorating my house on a very, very tight budget.  So most of the items I add will be hand made or thrifted. 

If you go back among my posts you will notice my first attempts at pillow making.  These sad creatures have been put out of their misery and their fluff transplanted into new ones.   I will post on these soon.  But first, here is a peek at my latest painting.

I needed a center piece for my living room, so I bought some canvas and went to work.  Thank you Hobby Lobby for 30% off sales!  With no home church and no job I have felt like a plant pulled from the roots and drug around by some weirdo gardener who isn't sure where to put me.  So roots have been on my mind.  And cities.  Always Jerusalem, beautiful and new waiting for her decent to her proper place in our world.  So I knew I wanted a city with roots in mid-air.  And since I have traveled abroad twice, both times landing in Frankfurt, Germany I decided to use her skyline as inspiration for my levitating city.  I typed "frankfurt, germany silhouette" into the google machine and did an image search and did a rough sketch of the coolest one I saw.  It is by Luigi Di Serio and you can find it here - scroll down and it is the third photo. 

Here is my sketch and a color test.

I am glad I used the color test as inspiration, but found this picture did not go as planned.  Funny how that happens, huh?  But I am pleased with the result.  Here is a photo of the tri-panel during the third layer, the addition of the city silhouette.

And the finished project. 

I think it almost looks like a battleship, what do you think?