Found Art Friday Painting : Change

When I found out Cathy Nichols' theme for this month's Found Art Friday was "Change",  I went blank.  What could I paint that would represent change?  The only thing I could think of was the changing seasons.  Hmm... I could've painted four different trees, one for each season.  No.  I procrastinated, so then I didn't have enough time.  I couldn't think of anything else to represent change, so I finally decided to just start and see where it would lead me. 

I have been wanting to do a striped background, so I started there on a 6"x6" canvas.  I asked a friend for ideas.  She mentioned my "thing" for leaves, and that I could do something about turning over a new leaf.  Wow.  Genius.  That's what I would paint over the background, a turning leaf.  Then my mind slowly started to swim with ideas...change of scenery, direction, heart, pace, mind, etc... Hmm, where were all these ideas last week?  Somewhere in there I saw a street sign in my mind with a U-turn symbol on it.  I decided to go with that, but later changed it from U-turn, to this symbol.  

Not turning back... just changing direction.

A lot of people I know are going through major changes, some intentional, some not.  Some for the better, and some, well...not so much.  This blog has changed things for me quite a bit.  As my husband said "This blog has created a monster".  When I asked him to explain he said "Well, an art monster"!  Ha ha.  How true.  Since starting this blog I've finished more pieces in these past 5-6 months, than I have in the last several years!  It's given me a much needed kick start.

I'm not sure if I started this blog because I was ready for this and already on my way, or this blog is what started all this overflow of creativity.  The chicken or the egg.  Either way, I don't care, I'm just so thankful that this is where I am now.  I can't imagine it being any different.  The challenges I'm taking part in, the other artists I've met, the amazing artwork that's out there inspiring me, it all adds up to me wanting to paint and create non-stop.  What a wonderful and very welcome change.

Mixed- Media Painting: To The Sea-Green

Here is my mixed-media painting for Cathy Nichols' Found Art Friday and Louise Gale's Creative Color Challenge.   They decided to combine them since the two went together so well.  The Found Art Friday theme is "To The Sea", and the Color Challenge theme is "Sea-Green".

I immediately knew I wanted to paint waves, but when I started to work on it this Tuesday I was not very happy with where it was headed.  Yesterday when I worked on it, I started by painting over what was already there (3 smaller waves) because it didn't have the impact that I wanted.  When I painted this larger, more graphic wave I immediately liked it better.

 I added the "spray" by rubbing on Golden's Fiber Paste with my finger.  When dry, I rubbed a bit of Heavy Gel Medium in a gloss, to add a bit more sheen in areas.  It still didn't look finished, so I added the border around it.  I did this by 1st wetting a stamp, then rubbing over it with a black water-soluable(WS) crayon.  I sprayed it with more water then stamped it on, then I rubbed out some areas with a wet paper towel to soften it.  I then took black and then white WS crayons and outlined the border here and there.

For the Color Challenge you have to use only shades of sea-green, along with black and white if you want, and this week Louise said we could also add metallics.  I added painted cheesecloth in the bottom corner, and added a few objects that looked like they were found in the ocean....a smashed piece of copper pipe (hey, you never know), a silver shell, sea glass, and a brass ring, along with some copper wire.  To balance it I added a copper tack to the other three corners.

I'm not sure if it's finished yet, I feel like I need to work on the border a bit more, but I'll see what happens when I step away from it for a bit.  If I change anything, I'll show you a picture of it later.

I'm off to go to the Sawdust Festival in Laguna Beach (a wonderful art show)!  I'm so excited!  Woohoo!  There are some amazing artists every year, can't wait to see what they came up with this time.  Bye.

Umm...yeah, I'm back and yes...I need to fix the border.  I'll post pics when it's done.