Tea Party gone digital

I had just a few minutes to do art today so I decided to play with the image digitally before attempting it again. These images are the results of my experimenting with the image in photoshop elements. This method is similar to experimenting with an acetate sheet over the painting - nothing is permanent and you get a pretty good idea what will work.
I'm pretty impressed with the results of the first stage of my editing BUT I'm pretty sure I don't have a "clone stamp" tool in my painting kit. It's neat how you can pick up the surrounding pixels and paint them over top. For example, the cut line behind the ladies was quite sharp and noticeable but after painting over it with the clone stamp tool and a watercolor brush (digital of course) it is much less noticeable.
In the second stage (layer) I picked up some of the darker pixels and used a "heavy stipple" wet media brush to to move that color around in the painting. I'm not quite sure whether this is working but it shows what can be done quickly to get an idea about the next step to take with the paper version. Enjoy! Retweet this

Tea Party part 2

I found a neat copyright-free photo of 4 ladies sitting around a quilting frame working and visiting together. I printed it onto an overhead and attempted a transfer onto this monoprint using acrylic medium. As you can see, not much of the photo transferred and portions of it stuck to the surface and lifted paper when I peeled it off. I'm still getting used to the BFK Reeves paper. I find a huge difference between transferring onto bare paper and a print or painted surface. More practice I suppose...

So, on to plan B - since I damaged the paper I felt the best option left was collage. I reprinted the image onto tracing paper and used acrylic medium to collage it over top of the first mess. And now I've got other challenges... I'm going to need to creatively integrate the image into the print. I have a few ideas to try - more new territory for me. This photo shows where the piece is at this evening. I hope to have some time to work on it tomorrow so stay tuned!

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Tea Party Monoprint

I worked on this monoprint over the weekend using Yupo for a printing plate. I missed taking a photo of the plate prior to printing because I was in a hurry. This first picture is the Yupo plate after I printed it - not much paint left so I would call the printing process fairly successful.
I began this project with a farm theme in mind. The trees and barn were cut out of drywall mesh and stuck on as a resist. I expected that some paint would seep down into the grid pattern as I applied it with the brayer but the paint mix must have been too dry. The sky started out blue with just a bit of purple but the dioxazine purple is so strong it overpowered the blue. So, I just went with it and played the yellow /purple compliment game. I rolled gamboge on top of the tree area. The dish pattern was done by dampening cotton lace, laying it over the painted yupo, covering with wax paper, brayering over and then lifting the wetted area with a kleenex.
This second picture shows the resulting monoprint. I left myself a decent sized light value area thinking I would do an image transfer there.
Tomorrow's post - how to nearly wreck and [hopefully] rescue a painting from disaster... stay tuned! Retweet this

Sky Study (10"x6")

I decided to do a quick sky study today. I usually use ultramarine blue for my skies but thought I'd find out what I get with pthalo blue instead. Phthalo is a cool blue and it gives great grey/black when mixed with burnt sienna. It follows it should be good for greys and stormy skies. But it's a bit too blackish grey... I think I'll go back to the warmer ultramarine blue because it' gives more realistic warm greys for a stormy sky. Enjoy! Retweet this

Painting Havoc

Two years ago Ron bought me 34 small tubes of Winsor Newton watercolor paint for $30 on Ebay. Most of them have been collecting dust in my drawer because I simply don't need them. For the past 2 years I've been using a limited palette (7 basic + 4 optional). This has forced me to learn color theory hands on and helped my confidence grow. However, I've been curious about some of these colors and I let myself experiment with them using a dropper to see how they blended and mixed wet in wet on the paper. The colors were veridian green, olive green, cadmium orange, cobalt blue, brown madder.


The first photo shows the most interesting learning - cadmium orange floats and spreads in wild bursts of color. Then it dries chaulky - I'm not a fan.

The second photo shows how carried away I got on this little experiment. It was a mess! Thanks for not commenting on this one folks... but I did give the good, bad and ugly warning right up front... Hopefully I'll have something prettier for tomorrow!

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Abstract with Transfer

Here's another of the monoprints that I've been working to finish. The first photo is the Yupo plate just before printing - I could have left a larger opening and had a bigger image transfer... The second photo is the finished product on BFK Reeves printmaking paper. The image transfer is my Mom at about 10 years of age. I used acrylic medium to transfer the photo to the printmaking paper, then some acrylic to enhance the image in places. I also strengthened some of the areas of the monoprint with solid watercolor and various textures.

I'm becoming a bit more comfortable with abstraction but I struggle to know when I'm done ;o).

[double click on either image to see it larger]

Enjoy!

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Christmas Monoprint (6"x4")

This is an monoprint plate ready for printing. I'd like a lighthearted singing snowman like this to send to my friends. I hope that this will turn out well enough to use as a Christmas card this year. Can I just say that there is no method more fun than spritzing drops of water on to a painting and then lifting them up to get an instant snow storm. We'll soon see.

I have a lot of work in the hopper and slowly but surely I'm making progress on each of them. I'm also having a blast trying various image transfer methods. Hopefully I'll become proficient enough to use them in my art.

Enjoy!

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