Monday, July 29, 2013

I LOVE To Paint

Nothing makes me happier then doing art and I am seriously blessed in my life that everyday I get to get up and do exactly what I love for every waking moment of every single day of my life!  I have been painting non stop for days now and have 4 finished pieces to share with you, if you follow my FB page you probably already seen a few or all of them already.  The other piece that I am working on is the custom painting from my last give away and I am video taping the process as well so I will soon have a new video to share with you as soon as I am finished, hopefully by the end of this week.  All I can tell you in the mean time is its 9x12 mixed media on canvas, there is a lot of pink and purple, a girl with big blue eyes, brown hair in pig tail braids and wearing cat ears on her head, she has freckles and there's a panda hanging out with her!

My inspiration for this one was punctuation,  if you didn't notice yet you should be able to pick out all the different punctuation throughout the painting such as the asterisks (*) the question mark (?)  the quotations (") and the big etc. for the owls belly! lol  even the branch the owl is sitting on is a square bracket [ turned on its side. lol  I really didn't have much of a plan when I started this one other then the punctuation so I just started throwing colors on the canvas and many many layers later I arrived at this and I couldn't be happier with how it turned out!



To The Point
4" x 4" x 1.5"
mixed media original 
original SOLD but prints available on Etsy

This next canvas actually started out as a panda! yes a panda! lol I know what your probably thinking, she doesn't look anything like a panda! lol This I already know!  Sometimes, actually most of the time if I start a painting with a plan, I never ever follow it, something completely different then my plan ends up coming out so that is why most of the time I just dive in without a plan, I figure whats the point?  The painting is just going to do what it wants anyhow! lol I can't say that I am unhappy with the direction this painting took though, I love this girl and so glad she decided to make an appearance!  When I finished the background I no longer could see a panda, but rather instead all I could see was this girl so clearly it was as if I had already painted her so I really didn't have a choice in the matter!  I was recently asked by someone where I got this girl from and all I could say to that was "my imagination?" not sure if I misunderstood the question or not but in case anybody is wondering, yes I do paint all my girls from my imagination, they are my own creations and not digital stamps or cut outs or anything like that.  I am thinking about creating some big eyed girl digital stamps to sell in my Etsy Shop soon so if you are into that type of thing keep your eyes peeled!



Love Wish Dream
4" x 4" x 1.5"
mixed media original 
original and prints available on Etsy


This canvas started out so different then it ended up its not even funny! If you can believe it I actually started by mod podging the entire canvas with lined paper like you use in school, the kind with the blue horizontal lines and one red vertical line down the side. I then doodled in black pen all over the entire canvas and it looked really cool! However then I started to add paint and before you knew it there was absolutely no trace left of that first layer! lol  I am totally ok with that though, its all about the process for me and I had a lot of fun making this canvas and I am thrilled with how the finished piece looks so its all good in my books! 



Embrace Imperfection
4" x 4" x 1.5"
mixed media original 
original and prints available on Etsy

This next owl canvas actually started out to be an owl and ended up as an owl! Imagine that! lol My inspiration for this one actually came from a treasury on Etsy HERE I just happened to come across the treasury in my activity feed and thought it was so soft and pretty, I loved the cute items and the soft colors and they were totally sticking in my head, urging me to paint them so I started out mod podging this canvas with 3 colors of tissue paper, pastel yellow, pastel peach/pink and baby blue.  There's about 5 or 6 layers so you cant see too much of the tissue paper now but it still gives great texture that shows through all the layers!  I have to say this may even be one of my favorite owl paintings yet, I am totally in love with it!!


Twinkle In The Sky
4" x 4" x 1.5"
mixed media original 
original and prints available on Etsy

This is the treasury that inspired me below...

Thank you for looking! 

Monday, July 22, 2013

New Artwork

I just finished a 3 day long Art Walk Street Show in Walkerville area of Windsor this weekend and it went well other then the horrible sun burn I now have as a result! lol  Thank you to everyone who came out to see me, I had a great time getting to talk with all of you!

I finished some new artwork the Thursday night before the show started and just photographed it on Friday morning before I left so I never really got to share any of it, all I did was upload the pics briefly when I had a moment to facebook.

I created a new owl set of 2 mini canvas`s titled LoveDrops, one of which sold this weekend but the other one is now available in my Etsy Shop.  When I started these 2 pieces all I knew is that I wanted to work with teal raindrops and sheet music, I really didnt have anymore of a plan then that.  I used a mixture of acrylic paints, gelatos, inks, drawing pens, watercolor pencil crayons, markers, and probably something else that Im not thinking of at the moment.  





 Available on Etsy




SOLD


I also created a new ACEO as I was down to only 5 originals in my collection.  I did at one point have 7 of those baseball card holder sheets that hold 9 cards per page full of my handpainted ACEO`s so it feels kind of strange to only have 6 cards now! lol  I do have about 40 something of ACEO prints but thats just not the same!  Back at the beginning of summer I put a big sale on in my shop to clear out all of the ACEO`s that were a year old or older so they were marked down to $5 or a $1 so that I could clear them all out to make room for new ones, so this was my own doing! lol  Now I can get back into my ACEO painting addiction and pump out a ton of new cards, well thats the idea anyhow!

This ACEO didn`t really start with a plan either, in fact I very rarely have a plan when I start painting.  What I usually do as what I did with this one is pick out some colors that I like at the moment and start applying them to the surface of my painting, in this case an ACEO size of cold press watercolor paper and in this case it was Cobalt Teal and Quinacridone Magenta that I smeared all over the card with my fingers and used my heat tool to dry it.  I stamped a word stamp in black and added some white, blue and yellow circles and once dry again I could so clearly see the shape of a little girl holding a heart in the paint!  I painted the little girl in and cut out a piece of sheet music for her dress and punched a heart out of a page of an old book. 




Songs of Happy
Mixed Media ACEO

Sunday, July 14, 2013

2 Paintings + 1 Video

I created 2 new mini canvas's over the last couple of days.  They both started out with every intention of becoming Owl paintings however once I got going on them everything changed and they were speaking to me differently.   I think I should really stop going into paintings with any expectations at all because in the end they are just going to do what they want despite what my expectations for them are! lol


You may recognize the girl in this painting from a previous painting I did titled Pondering which caught on fire the very same day that I finished painting it!  When I started this painting below I had every intention of painting an owl so its not like I went into it intending on recreating this girl however once I finished the background there was just no way I could put an owl on it, it was just screaming at me "NO OWL!"  So I stared at it for a while waiting for a figure to appear in my mind and she appeared so clearly it was as if I had already painted her on this canvas!  I knew she would be reborn again somewhere in one of my paintings without me forcing it so I am glad that I waited and just let it happen because I am really happy with how this one turned out!



Traveler Adventurer Artist
4" x 4" x 1.5"
mixed media original




Sprinkle With Art
4" x 4" x 1.5"
mixed media original
In my Etsy Shop

I created a video of my process for this second painting.  Check it out below and I hope you enjoy!




Check out my Etsy Shop HERE!

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

For The Love Of Art

Well, Im going into week 2 of this horrible nasty cold that I seemed to have caught!  Though sick I have still been doing some painting though not as much as I would have liked.  I can't really afford to be sick with another show only a week and a half away!

Anywho, with the whining out of the way I can share with you what I have managed to complete here so far. This first painting that I am going to share with you was inspired by the general public at the art shows that I do.  Too often I hear from people about how they love my art and would love to buy some of it but it just doesn't match their decor in their house at the moment!  I just want to scream every time I hear this!  Personally I think that if you are buying art just because it matches your couch, or a lamp, or a rug, then those are all the wrong reasons to buy art!  When you buy a piece of original artwork that is something that is probably going to be with you for the rest of your life so it should be purchased because you have a love for that artwork, because it "speaks" directly to you in some way!  Furniture and our home decor in general will change over the years so if you are buying art only because it happens to match the color of your couch at the moment then what happens when you get a new couch?  I could go on an on.... this is a rant that I am extremely passionate about but instead of ranting about it with words I put my passion into a new painting and so I digress...




"Art Doesn't Have 2 Match The Couch"
6" x 12" x 1.5"
mixed media on wood

After selling completely out of all the mini owl canvas's that I finished previously, I did manage to complete another one which is the first of many more to come.  This owl painting was inspired by a line of Adidas clothes that I was looking at with my husband at the mall recently.  I really loved the neon colors and geometric patterns...




"Rad"
4" x 4" x 1.5"
mixed media on canvas