Orange you glad I'm back?

Getting ready to start on a series of new paintings. Here's a recent collage.

Skull Table

I'm currently working on this occasional table with neanderthal skulls on it. It's watercolour on gesso. I'll post the finished product when it's done and assembled. I thought a smaller project like this would be less overwhelming than the headboard I was working on, and also it's a medium I much prefer to acrylics.

Aaaaand as Promised...

...The no-frills version.

The jacket was really hard. It was impossible - at least, for me at this time - to do justice to the crazy colours of his reflective jacket without using neon watercolour or acrylic, neither of which I had. PS was helpful, though.

Frigging Around with Photoshop

Here's the cheesy results of my latest foray into photoshop...I learned how to do things such as starry nights (scrapped), lens flare, gradients, and fog. It's a watercolour painting I did and scanned. I'm going to post a simpler version with a white background, soon.

Traffic Boxes

I'm one of the artists selected this year to participate in the HRM Traffic Box Program. I'll be painting one of the boxes at an intersection in Burnside. I'll be starting sometime around mid-June. This is my first outdoor mural. Here is a sketch of what I'm planning on doing. I am using custom stencils as I did in a previous commission, for a graphic, retro kids' book look.

And here is a collage I did during "art night." It's called Susan Boyle Room.

More Work from Face Value

Here is some more work from Alison and I's April show at Utility, Face Value. I did about 75 of these portraits which are all watercolour and pencil on gessoed bible tracts. The quotes are attributed to the person in the portrait. Each name leads to that person's Wiki entry. These are some of my favourites...

Simone Weil

Harriet Beecher Stowe

Richard Rose

Kahlil Gibran

G.K. Chesterton

Molly Ivins

I really enjoyed using this method of working on top of gesso with watercolour. It's an odd process that takes a little getting used to. Basically the gesso is obviously less porous than paper, and while the pigment does sink in a bit, it takes longer, and in the meantime you can kind of push it around with your brush, or even remove it, also with the brush. I think I got really good results and would like to experiment more with it in the future.

Fun Furniture

Alison and I's show was successful and it's nice to have it over with. I totally didn't promote it at all on this blog because that's just how well organized I am. But I'll post some photos from the opening in a (near) future post. Anyway it's nice to have that over with. My current project, among other things, is painting this headboard for a child. What child, you ask? Whichever child's parents purchase it from me on Kijiji. I suppose, alternately, some adult who's super-into fairies might buy it. The headboard is a leftover from my previous roommates Chris and Amy (thanks guys!). Anyway the basic idea is to paint a mural on the headboard (and any other furniture I can get my hands on) and see if there is a market for this, when I'm not doing wall murals and other stuff. 

Here is the headboard: 

And here is what I have done so far, in the middle of the back of the shelf:

I was thinking about doing the headboard in a neat fantasy forest theme with a unicorn and wizard or whatever; eventually I got the idea to draw these two fairies having a sloppy tea party on some of those red and white mushrooms. I tried to steer away from making it too sexy/druggy/scary. I DID however want the fairies to look a little "off," like they are missing a chromosome or something. What the hell, they are fairies after all. 

They'll be surrounded by large flowers, grasses, etc., a la Honey I Shrunk The Kids. I'll probably throw in some crazy bugs and stuff too. Almost the whole thing will be covered. I might even install a reading light concealed in the ceiling of the shelf. I'm excited to finish it and see if there is a market for this type of stuff. I also want to do custom furniture that's a bit more sophisticated, with custom stencils and whatnot.