365 Day 311

the moose-creature with the monocle just wasn't doing it for me

I was playing around with the red repurposed canvas and I just wasn't happy with the moose-creature with the monocle. I wasn't all that fond of him to begin with, but today he reeeeeally looked wrong for the picture.










Because I am trying to incorporate some things I haven't used very often/recently, I pulled out this great handmade paper. It is red with gold leaves on it.

I turned it over because the leaves were too large to go with the creatures and because I wasn't sure how to deal with the gold ink (paint?) later on.






To my delight, the leaves kinda show through like I hoped they would.

Oh yeah...I like newsprint a lot and I laid some of that down first to help cover up the moose-creature's Sharpie marker image...then I used gel medium to adhere the paper to the newsprint.






I like the white halo of the newsprint.

I am starting to see new guys coming up already.












I also wanted to use a not-so-great block print (the print itself is not-so-great...I love the image) that I made back in relief printmaking class.

Another reason I wanted to use this particular image was that it is so finished and stark compared to the other creatures that are still just penciled in. I am hoping it will give me painting or finishing ideas.

One more reason I added this new guy was in contrast to the other creatures -- this guy was one of the images that came from the automatic drawings from my sketch book...so I kinda sorta fell like I drew him...as opposed to how I feel like I am just coloring in the other guys that are emerging on their own...like I don't really have a say in how they look or who they are. There is an element of that to the sketch book guy, but I feel like I had more input with him...on some level.




This is where the new guy is located on the canvas in relation to where the moose-guy used to be.















And here is an overall view of the entire canvas.
For now.

365 Day 236

creatures emerging and revealing themselves

I have had this canvas for some time now. It was originally given to me as a birthday present -- a sort of giant birthday card. It had swirly metallic lettering and teensy seed beads and glitter and was wonderful at the time, but then it was stuck in a closet for a long time.

I don't remember exactly when I pulled it out and scraped off as much of the glue and beads as I could. In doing this, many small tears and holes happened so I covered the entire surface with this wonderful stripey handmade paper that I love and never found a use for. When I matte medium'd the canvas and laid the paper down and then covered the paper again on top with more matte medium, it really soaked in and changed the look of the paper a lot...but covered the little holes and tears. The other thing that happened is that you can sort of see some of the images and beads through the stripes...in places...but you absolutely cannot see the original lettering or cake or anything...I mean, you can see some swirly bits, but you can't read it.



The canvas with the paper on it...and turned sideways instead of the original direction.


I had no intention of working on this tonight, but it caught my eye when I was about to leave my desk...







...a bird was emerging tonight from under the paper...I couldn't ignore it...I have tried to draw birds before and it never really works for me. So I took this as something that needed to happen.









I darkened the lines a bit, now you can see the bird better.










Then this creature emerged along side of the bird.











I tried to ignore the heart-shape that was calling me...then I saw the eyes and the whale tail...then the body started to show itself. Believe me, this is not like anything I would draw on my own.

This whole thing is reminding me of the linocut sketch book from the relief printmaking class -- how I kept finding creatures in my scribbled pages. This is taking things quite a bit farther for me, though...this is most likely going to require painting...LOL.

Here is the newest creature with more of a body.

I think the painting of these creatures will be similar to the Experimental Art Night painting exercises and not be as stressful as the painting of plaster cloth guys.





And here is how all three of them look on the canvas.

I am going to leave this and come back to it every now and then, the way I do with the canvas that started out as the three ghosts...that one keeps evolving, too.

Ooops -- re-reading this and looking at the photos, it looks like a fox or wolf head is emerging near the heart-shape face creature's tail...maybe I'm not done for tonight yet.