I am really happy with everything BUT the flowers. LOL. The colors look dead to me. I wanted to be muted, but, not blah. Haha. I am considering going back in, and carving out loose, wonky, floral shapes.
We had snow last night, briefly. Wet snow and rain before that. It was damp at 1:30 am. Sometime later, we received snow on the mountains. Some is hanging around, but very little. It is going to be sunny for the next two weeks, and getting warmer.
I was not planning for them to be hung side by side. I did not plan ahead. Haha. The grass and stems are crinkled paper, I added dry watercolor crayon to add interest there.
I went too dark with the teal, a new brand of paint for me. When it dried I sanded some of it off. The lettering was still hidden, so I used a pen to accent it. I decided to do the orange flowers as well, even though it was showing through a bit better. The white centers and some of the black dots are puffy paint.
I am calling them done for now. I need to move on. But they look too flat to me. I should add some texture or smudging to the sky. And a few leaves would help as well. There is a texture from previous layers, these are recycled boards. Thought about adding puffy swirls to the sky, haha. Not quite sure I could pull it off. Stressed big time over the teeny tiny birds. Hahaha. Open to suggestions. 🙂
Artists are just children who refuse to put down their crayons. Al Hirschfeld
I worked on days 4, 5, and 6 at the same sitting. It was late, and when I ran out of some of the paint colors on my palette, I made some marks with the knife and left it to dry overnight. The first layers are below.
Coming back to it, I added more cream and more of the soft earth tone. Again with the knife. I was not successful in creating an interesting texture, so I played, and played, just filling the paper with paint.
I scanned it. and thought about cutting it down. Finding an interesting section, and cropping it into a new piece of art. Or maybe cutting into long strips, and creating a triptych.
Played some more, made moons. There was a round shape on the right that inspired me. The moons are on their own transparent layer. Clipped top and bottom to fit the canvas.
Moons, Digital.
Decided they needed separation from the jumbled background layer. Added shadow shapes. I had to erase part of this shape, the moons are semi-transparent. I left them that way to show some of the texture from underneath.
Moon Shadows, Digital.
I copied a section from the background layer and pasted it strategically. The moons needed separation from the areas of the same moon color in the painting. I erased as needed so the edges could not be seen, then I blurred the edges, so they were even less noticeable. This is quick and easy, for this piece of “play”. I would do it differently for a more intentional piece of art.
Taupe Warmth, Digital.
On the first day of painting, I taped down the papers. The second day on this one, I had already taken the tape off. It left a messy edge, that I kinda like. This all was just for color play after all. Haha.
Finally, I thought why not add some birds to the mix. Another PNG, transparent layer. I added a color overlay to the black birds, it was just too harsh. A deeper shade of the moon shadows was just right.
If you have four minutes to kill, there is a video here that talks about working with layers in Photoshop. There are several short videos that break it down. Sort of a digital collage. LOL. Yes, I am thinking of you Nelvia McGrath! And Sea Dean! Haha.
See what you can do with your daring with color and your ignorance mixed with it. Charles Webster Hawthorne, American Painter, 1872-1930
