new minis

That's a lot of images for some very tiny art!  

These are 4x4" minis I made to test out the addition of image transfers on fabric and embroidery thread to attach the fabric bits.

The more opaque pieces of fabric are cotton with image transfers and the sheer pieces are silk.  The silk didn't take the image transfer for some reason but if I decide I just have to have it I could always try those printable silk organza sheets.  I assume the effect would be the same.

I like how this is working on the small scale so next up will be to add it onto a larger piece.

more encaustics and show prep

Three more encaustics, because I wanted a few more to bring with me to Crafty Wonderland.  These are 8x8", 9x12", and 8x10".

I've got most everything put together for the show...it's coming up soon now!  I'm in the midst of printing up some scarves and pillow covers.  I'll have some process photos to post here at some point but so far I was having so much fun printing that I forgot to stop and take photos!  I'll try to remember.

more waxing

Two more encaustic pieces, 8x8".

These turned out oddly much warmer in tone than the last two.  The only thing I did different (I think anyway) was melting the encaustic medium in a different container.  And the medium is a bit thicker although I put on fewer layers.  I guess I wanted to try encaustics to introduce a bit more unpredictability into my work so...success :)

I like that using the TAP transfer paper in and on the wax instead of on paper is that the transfers tend not to dominate the piece so much.  The photos I included in these pieces would have ironed on about 5 times darker than they look here.

square-ing

I hope you aren't sick of the sight of these mini paintings because I'm having so much fun making them! These are both 6x6" watercolor, gouache, graphite, and image transfers on 300lb. cold press watercolor paper.

I love getting to incorporate some of the things from my digital collages into actual paint-on-paper paintings. I printed several of the bits of handwriting and typography multiple times on the sheets of transfer paper and it's interesting to me to reuse them in a different way each time.

I think if I only made collages out of the original pieces of paper I would never be able to use these things I've inherited. It's one thing to cut up an old book or magazine I bought but I would never cut up my grandma's knitting books or chop into her notes on a knitting pattern.

And totally unrelated: I had a dream about fireflies a few nights ago. I've never seen fireflies in real life but they were unbelievably beautiful in my dream.

last of this batch

4x4" watercolor, gouache, graphite, and image transfers on watercolor paper.

Here's the last two of the stack. I'm really happy with how these image transfers are working - they're sort of translucent (as long as I only print things that aren't super dark). It totally feels like I'm doing some Photoshop layering but in real life - so fun. I miss having an "undo" sometimes though.

more squares

Slightly bigger this time - 6x6" watercolor, graphite, gouache, and image transfers on cold press watercolor paper.

This is some paper I picked up on sale - I'm usually too cheap to buy 300lb. paper so I ended up with cold press this time. It's relatively smooth for cold press so I think I like it well enough for the price :)

tiny little squares

4x4" graphite, watercolor, gouache, image transfers on 300lb. cold press watercolor paper.

I started a whole pile of these several days ago - I cut a bunch of squares, then I did all the pencil doodling, then all the watercolor and let them dry, then the gouache, and then some iron-on transfers on top. I decided to skip the acrylic layer that I was messing around with before because it didn't seem like it was adding that much to the pieces. So that made the image transfers infinitely easier - all I had to do was plunk the iron down and wait until the transfer stopped making a little hissing sound and then peel off the backing paper. SO much easier than applying them to the acrylic.

There's something very satisfying about going straight in and drawing crooked wonky lines and circles with no ruler! I'm sure I will still use my rulers and circle templates and things on some pieces but working on these tiny squares is so fun :)

trial #2

Here's another one - same paper, same size, watercolor, gouache, etc. I mixed up the acrylic layer over the top a little differently this time. It's a bit more watery and I think I didn't put enough white pigment in...? It doesn't have the sort of frosted translucent quality I was hoping for, anyway. It's hard to tell how it's going to dry while I'm mixing it.

I kind of like it like this but I think I'm going to try an image transfer on top of it to see what happens.

Camera/film update: I've put a roll of film through each of the cameras...just sending it out now. Can't wait to see what happened! :)

experimenting!

I can't believe it's August already! This summer is flying by. Of course, we didn't get any warm weather really until a couple of weeks ago so that may be what's confusing me.

Here's something I've been working on this week. This is pencil, watercolor, gouache, and a little colored pencil on 6x6" cold press watercolor paper. I've been thinking a lot about ways to loosen up my abstract work on paper and maybe incorporate a looser sketchier quality into the figure pieces in the abstract layers, too. So I played around with it in my sketchbook and tried actually painting a couple of things but this is the first one I don't hate :) It's still diagram-based but no rulers or circle templates this time.

Over the top is a mix of acrylic medium and a tiny bit of white and gold pigment to make it slightly opaque, plus a little water to thin it down. I saw somebody doing a faux-encaustic look with acrylic medium somewhere on the internets and I've been wanting to try it.

I got some 300 lb. watercolor paper to try it on so it could handle the thick layer of acrylic without curling up - plus I figured if I don't like this effect it would be great to collage on for the same reason.

painty paint

Oil on canvas on panel, 12 x 12".

I wanted to do a pink oil painting to round out the blues and greens. I think oil painting is very relaxing for me because pretty much the only thing I can do wrong is overwork it. I mean, if I were doing something more detailed or realistic there would be tons of things that could go wrong but with these, any bit of color or pencil or any stray brushstrokes can be blended away. And unlike watercolors, I've got, oh, about three hours to notice that I don't like something and change it :)

I use four or five brushes at a time - one or two for each color I'm using so I can just swap them when I want to move a color back and forth. And I don't get too worried if the colors start getting into other areas - I just let 'em go. I like the sort of scattered effect and I love the brushstrokes that show when this happens.

brushy brush brush

Two square oil paintings - small one is 6x6" and the larger one is 10x10".

I can't remember what I used to mix the greeny blue on the other pair of these that I did. I don't think this was it but I already mailed them off to their new owner so I can't confirm :) I need to get in the habit of noting some of the color mixes I use when I'm doing oils because I have just enough random tubes of color to be confusing. I used to make little swatches on canvas paper and stick them into a sketch book with a note about the colors I used. I should get back in the habit of doing that when I get something I'm especially happy with.

Still drying

Here's what I was working on last night - it's too wet to move or scan right now. I think it was a 10x10" panel with canvas. It's fun to paint loose and draw in pencil lines in the wet paint (although they don't show up that well in this photo). I draw the lines all wobbly and random and all the paint lines are wobbly too! Scary! I don't know why I'm ok with oils being sketchy but all my pencil/gouache/watercolor drawings have to be super clean.

My experimenting with gouache and opaque colors have made me want to use the oil colors in a more glaze-y, translucent way. I hope the scans will show this because I think it's a nice effect in this piece. I use alkyd medium to make the paint dry faster anyway and I just increase the proportion of medium to paint a bit to make it more of a glaze.

Gouache - this time on tinted paper!

Here's a couple little gouache paintings - 8x10" on tinted Stonehenge paper. I like this neutral on neutral thing. It's interesting to play with with the opacity of the paint when it has to compete with a color that's already there. I'm putting together some references for more figure-related drawings but I figured if I'm in a mood to paint I should just go for it. So there'll be more figure drawings sometime but today I made abstracts :)

Little oil paintings to go along with the gouache

Here's two oil paintings that I did a couple of days ago and had to wait for them to dry a little bit before I moved them. I worked on them both at the same time - one advantage of working small is that I can fit two canvases on the easel at once. I wanted to try the same kind of lines with color blocks like in the gouache pieces but with more blended areas and less plain white.

I'm getting better at stopping myself before I blend away all the rougher areas like I used to. I feel like if I go back and take away all the unblended edges it loses some of the liveliness. Which is ok too, but I did those last year and I wanted to change things up :) And I'm learning to love when the geometry starts to go wobbly because I'm using oil paint and brushes and not pencils and rulers. I try to keep going back to what it is that I love about oil painting which is taking a solid line and blending out parts of it, and putting brushy scrubby texture all over. There's no way to do all that and maintain a perfect right angle...well, I can't, anyway.

Next painting

This one is 8x8" so it fit on my scanner (whew). Very similar to the last one, obviously. I like things that are abstract but still reference some idea that I'm interested in.

I think you can see from these two paintings more of my process than when I continue smoothing everything out. And I think maybe you can see why I go through brushes so fast - all that scrubbing into the canvas wears them down to little stubs.