Afternoon Delight Rescuing An Old Painting

Fixing up old paintings is always fun. I can look at them periodically when I am looking for something and never see anything I want to do to change a painting. Then suddenly the inspiration hits me, and I have to "fix it."

I originally created this collage five years ago (dated on the back) and found it again this afternoon. It is a mixture of watercolor, acrylic and things I found in magazines.

It was just way, way too dark over all, so I covered the dark top parts with white gesso and let that dry, then mixed up some pale Hansa yellow acrylic up and proceeded to let the sunshine in. That is the effect I feel now when looking at the painting. It is joyful now, where before it was just kind of dark, but I didn't see it until today.

For additional information or purchase info, click here.

Life Under Construction

I took this photo a few minutes ago of a beautiful yellow Hibiscus blooming outside. We have had such difficulty with our little "farm" on our deck this season, because of what I think is mealy bugs. First they attacked a nice red hibiscus we had to throw out. Next we threw out a tomato plant, followed by a basil plant. Now the little nasties have attacked my prize yellow hibiscus plant. A couple of weeks ago I started hand to hand combat with them by treating it leaf by leaf with an alchohol rub of each leaf and sticking a swabbed q-tip into the new growth areas. I took a risk, not knowing if I would be killing it, but by the next day I could see it had recovered a bit. Each time I would see the white cottony crud, I would hit it with more alcohol, until finally we got this whole blossom. Up until now, they had a portion of the bloom which had been stunted. But, alas, I see more yuk I will have to go and attack. If anyone has a suggestion how to eliminate these little critters I would love to hear about it.

I spent the morning sitting in the gallery in Anna Maria Island this morning. It was very quiet there. When it was time to leave, it was about to storm outside. We decided to find a place to wait it out before coming back across the Sunshine Skyway Bridge. It rained a boat-load while we were having our lunch.

Thought I would show you what has happened to this painting since I took it down off my Etsy site. I first described the technique I used to create my painting surface here on the blog on March 27th, in an article named "Fun With String and Glue." However, I never liked the painting, and I eventually painted over it. I am putting it aside so I can look at it for awhile and decide how I can finish it. Which do you like better, before or after the start-over?

Oh Hey, there's some toes!

Shoemania Alive and Well

What woman doesn't just luuuuuv shoes? Well, maybe a few, but most of us would love to challenge Imelda Marcos for collecting many, many pairs of shoes if we had the means, the feet that could wear them comfortably and the space of course. We would also have to live with someone that understood a girl and her need for shoes and not go postal with the arrival of each new pair.

This brand-spanking new pair of peep-toe black pumps with monstrously high, high heels is begging someone, right now, to take them home. My original painting, Girl's First Love, has been lovingly painted by a girl who understands the value of shoes -- many, many pairs of shoes. Yep, I'm that shallow! The painting is on a 10 x 10 square canvas with no staples on the sides, so it can be hung with or without a frame. It would make a cute girly bedroom or powder room decoration for your wall. It is painted in acrylics and has a little Florida beach sand added for texture.

The painting will be available in my Etsy shop, DreamON. Click here.

Cabbage Palm

This is just such a cool technique. I just love it. First crumple up a piece of tissue paper. Apply it to a sheet of watercolor paper using a mixture of acrylic paint and sand. Then use a brayer to seal the tissue down to the watercolor paper. Next apply acrylic paints to the "paper" in a subtle variety of colors to make the "paper" look like it has been woven. When that is dry, then you are ready to apply your design to the base. In this case, I drew a Cabbage Palm onto the base and painted it. A couple of more steps and finally ending with rollering on a thinned-down purple acrylic. Sooo cool!

Cabbage Palm has been added to my Etsy shop. For more information, click here .

Tree Climber - Painting A Day

Tree Climber once again utilizes one of my favorite little animals, the little kitten. To use a kitten as a subject is completely natural for me, because I just love kitties.

I feel like I just might be getting back into the swing of the painting a day mode. Being sick with a stupid cold just absolutely laid me low, and it completely took any desire I had to paint. It exhausted me so that just the thought of painting made me want to run away. That combined with the fact that it's summer and has really gotten hot here.

A few years ago in my Experimental Painting class, we did some paintings called scrapings. The instructor cautioned us to save the paper towels we scraped the excess paint on. I saved it, and was able to utilize some of it in this painting for my collage materials. The tree in this painting is fabricated out of a drawing of black Sharpie poster paint marker, black permanent Sharpie marker and a Tombow gray pen. The background and sides were painted in a lovely light moonbeam yellow over which the drawing was made and the collage grew on.

This little 8 x 8 inch acrylic on canvas painting is available in my Etsy shop, DreamON. Click here for purchase details.

Yart Sale

Etsy sellers have organized a cyber yard sale of art for the time period of June 11 - 20. When holding a yard sale, we usually grab that cup of coffee and head out to sell the yard - or at least all the stuff we've dragged out into the yard. The main purpose of this is so that we will not have to put it all away again.

Smart Mug is 6 X 8 inches on watercolor paper and will serve the purpose nicely for a cup of coffee for the Yart Sale. It is painted in watercolors.

I have a few other things on special in my Yart Sale Section, so drop by and see what's out in my cyber Yart. Click here to see the Smart Mug or go to http://DreamON.Etsy.com .

Summer Colds Are The Worst

For the last week I have been battling this obnoxious cold that started in my chest. I haven't had too many colds in the last few years, so when I got one last fall it laid me low, and I can't believe I now have another one. Cooties, giant blue furry ones have descended upon my head. Blaaaahhhhh ! Yuckeeeeeeee! Eeeeeewwwwwwweeee! I hate being sick; it's such a waste of time! Needless to say it has slowed down my work, but I tell you what, I read in the Parade section of the newspaper this Sunday about some of the military who are coming home with horrible, horrible injuries and amputations to solve some of their problems. The ones featured go through these things and keep a great can-do attitude about it. That simply fills me with pride and admiration for them, and I feel like my complaining about a little cold is just soooooo pathetic.

After The Chick Fight

On to today's artistic project which was putting the final touches on something I started awhile ago, like so many of my projects. You might ask, why does she always have some old, unfinished project sitting around. Well, it's because I have been taught to have multiple projects going on all of the time. The theory is that it keeps you looser (yeah, complicated art word) because you aren't so wrought up concentrating on one masterpiece at a time.

OK this is not the greatest title, but After The Chick Fight with its empty gold, ornate picture frames and assorted "altered" photos just reminds me what might happen in an extreme situation when two chicks become jealous of one another's interest in what else, a man. We have already heard on the news about one chick's trek across the country in diapers to exact revenge upon another. Havoc is wreaked when anyone loses control, and there is much damage in the fray here.

So anyway, my original mixed-media collage is built upon gessoed masonite, and I have now put it up in my Etsy shop so you can find out more info about it. Click here.

Masquerade

Swimming Upstream is an acrylic painting, the dimensions of which are 19 X 12 inches. Its charm comes from observing the many semi-transparent layers and textures it took to create the painting. Searching through the image to locate a recognizable object becomes a secondary task. The cloudy semi-transparent areas of thinned white gesso serve to define the tall surreal figure in the middle of the painting., but should you not see her, do not be dismayed. For each viewer, something different may appear, and the cloudy white gesso gives an eerie feel to the piece. The design radiates outward from the center. The painting is finished with a high gloss layer of Mod Podge. It will be displayed in my Etsy Shop. Additional information is available with a click here.

Get Polished

Today's painting is Get Polished. It is an approximately 9 X 11 inch acrylic painting on Arches 140 lb. Cold Press Watercolor paper. It would make a cute little painting to have in your beauty shop or powder room. I will be putting this layered acrylic piece on Etsy where you can find more information about how it can be yours. Click here.

Painting A Day: Flowers On Red Kool Aid

Flowers On Red Kool Aid is my Painting of the Day. It photographed quite orange, but it is much more of a true red. Reds are very difficult to adjust. I put a layer of Pyroll Red under the Medium Red Acrylic layer and then scratched design elements into the top layer, so perhaps the camera read right thru to the much more orangey-red underlayer. I will try to get a photo with truer colors tomorrow when it's light.

For purchase information or more details about this painting click either here or on the photo. Flowers On Red Kool Aid is displayed in my Etsy store, DreamON.

Painting and Paper

Have you ever imagined what things would look like through another color of eyes? If my eyes were blue I might see blue trees like these. People might also be blue, and dogs and cats.

This painting of the day is a watercolor on Arches Cold Press Watercolor paper sized approximately 10 x 13 inches. For purchase information click here. I have put this painting up for sale on my Etsy site, DreamON.

Why do I paint on this paper? Paper is probably the most important piece of making a decent watercolor painting. Brushes are the next most important. Paint is important, but not for the reasons you might think. I have tried painting with yucky watercolor paper, and it makes your job as an artist so much more difficult it is amazing to think that just paper could make such a difference. If you have a choice of where to spend your learning dollars, spend it on brushes and paper. I have found I like Arches and Fabriano paper the best. I buy Arches watercolor paper 25 sheets at a time in order to get a better price. I find some of the other manufacturers don't offer the ability to buy a pack of 25 sheets. I like Fabriano because it gives a nice soft surface to work on. Arches is familiar and predictable, and it is a great surface to work on wet or dry. It is strong. I can lift color from it, and even scrub it without destroying it, if I'm careful that is. It also makes a good surface for acrylics. Both of these papers are professional quality.