Sometimes when a painting really does not go the way you want it to, it is easier just to cover the whole thing with gesso and start again.
So that's what I did with this painting, with the layers underneath providing some fantastic texture.
I continued to add more collage and stencilling. And by adding some grungy black marks with a Sennelier oil stick, it really began to take on a distressed shabby chic look.
In the next photo you can really see the amazing texture.
I thought the damask stencil really lent
itself to the whole new vintage vibe. Unfortunately it is quite an old
stencil and I'm not sure who made it but there are plenty of similar on Amazon and Ebay.
I will continue to work on this but I have several projects on the go at the moment, I keep getting so eager that I move on to my next idea without finishing my last project!
Anyway, I hope you like the video with the painting as it is at the moment,
This is the largest canvas I've ever attempted- a 24" x 24" box canvas and I'll admit it did seem quite daunting at first.
I decided on a neutral colour scheme but other than that I had no other plan for this canvas before I started.
I began by adding some gesso for a little added texture with a large spatula. I then added some Golden fluid acrylics in sepia, burnt umber and black. I love the almost watercolour effect of these acrylic paints.
I realised as I was working that I was focusing on the middle of the canvas too much and eventually tied it all together by adding areas of black on each side.
Towards the end I could see the beginnings of a citiscape but decided not to follow that path for this painting. Having said that I will at a later stage continue to work on this painting and see what transpires, it just isn't quite finished how I want it to be.
I quite like the result so far but now wish I had started with a lot more texture, but it's a good excuse to try again! I really enjoyed working large, there's just so much more space to experiment.
For those that watch me on Youtube you will probably notice this is
my first video where I have placed the camera to one side of me rather
than overhead. The canvas was just too big to lay flat on my work table
under the camera but I really like the different perspective of this video. You can just make out my camera rig that my husband made for me, it is so versatile that the cross bar acts as an easel too!
Given that this painting did take quite a bit if time, I have speeded it up quite a lot. I hope you enjoy it!
It is ages since I worked on canvas. As you may be aware from Youtube or my blog I usually work on card so it made a change to work on this 16" square 3D box canvas.
I wanted to create something that I hope is easy to follow and recreate. Just some simple acrylic painting with some stencilling and rubber stamping too.
I chose one of my favourite colour combinations of pink, teal and yellow on a grey background.
For my background I used Americana paints in storm cloud grey, slate grey and graphite, mixed with white. I love the Americana paints, they are good quality but reasonably inexpensive. Before the paint was dry I used a silicon brush shaper by Finnabair to scribble into the wet paint.
The first stencil I used (on top of the pink areas of paint) is by AALL & Create called Broken Circles, one of my favourite stencils. Rather than add paint with the stencil, I removed paint instead with a baby wipe.
I didn't want a really obvious pattern so I blurred it a little as I continued to paint. The pink paints I used are Pebeo acrylic paint in Fuschia and Decoart acrylic paint in cherry blossom pink.
The alphabet and number foam stamps are by Tim Holtz (I attach the link here). If you don't have any number stamps you could always type out some numbers and letters and collage them, assuming of course you have a printer.
It was a bit ambitious stamping on to a box canvas, but all I did was just put a heavy book roughly the same depth as my canvas underneath my painting so that it made the surface rigid enough to stamp on.
I did the scribbly script in Golden's teal fluid acrylic paint using a fine tip applicator bottle and splashed some of the teal paint as well.
I love to grunge up my paintings so I used the edge of AALL & Create stencil called "parched earth" to dab black acrylic paint along each edge of the canvas. Again I was not looking for definite pattern from the stencil, just more of a random effect. You could probably achieve the same results with other stencils or some paint dabbed on to on a piece of acrylic.
I have used a variety of tools to apply the paint, not least my yellow window glass cleaning scrapers! I find hardware stores very useful for finding more unusual tools for painting.
To finish my painting I added some yellow paint by Hobbycraft, again really inexpensive, but I love this mustard shade of yellow.
I hope you enjoy the Youtube video. Even if I inspire one person in the world to try abstract art then I feel my job is done!
Thank you so much for stopping by, I have a lot more abstract art in the pipeline so please do check back! Eleanor x
