Hi, firstly apologies for my prolonged absence, I've been dramatically under the weather with a bit of a Fibro flare, and despite even the thought of crafting usually lifting me it just didn't happen. However, we've now had some sunshine, my other half persuaded me to get out in the garden and I am improving :) (edited to add - apologies for the late appearance of this post, I'd scheduled it for the 1st but it didn't work!!)
So this month, my creation for Rhedd's Creative Spirit is actually a repurposing. I had a very early canvas that I'd painted, my first dabble with expanding paint (not actually sure that's its' name) but it's a paint that puffs up as it dries. Clever stuff!!
As it was an early piece, I've not been able to move past it, even though I didn't really like it. It just sat on ine side in my dining room, being ignored.
The other day, still feeling a bit fed up with things, I decided its' time had come. I needed to do something bold and dramatic, and I decided that to begin again from scratch with this canvas would be a great catalyst.
The original colour was white, silver and a pale turquoise, unfortunately I didn't think to take a 'before' picture, as I wasn't truly sure how this would work out!
I started with various shades of blue acrylics and literally just slapped it on all over! I blended some metallic green to some of the blue a slapped it on too! It was quite liberating really as I didn't have any plan as to where I was going with it.
Once dried, I dabbed some white flecks onto the textured areas (from the puffed paint) which is when I started to think of a bubbling sea. I then added some greeny-blue fibres using gel medium.
This seemed to create rays emanating from the corner, so I pondered what I could add to the corner. Then I remembered I had made some moulded clay faces ages ago and not used them I used some more gel medium to add a face to the corner, along with some more beads. I painted the face with a slightly darker greeny-blue.
I didn't think the small piece of netting was quite enough and so I added some floristry wire which was hexagonal (a bit like chicken wire) and trimmed it to fit around the face. I also added some light green seed beads around her face and along where I'd added the fibres.
Then to balance it out, I added a pile of Chinese coins in the opposite corner, again adding a touch of rub and buff.
I really enjoyed playing freeform, and it has helped me begin to feel better - let's hope this continues!!
Thanks for reading
Steffi :o) xx
