She is lost in the moment as she spreads her wings and moves to the rhythm of her heart. She is another piece for the CAS annual exhibition as one of 5 works on paper. These smaller pieces give me room to explore and play with what is possible. This post is about the process and I am enjoying the layers and the stamps. This is an amalgamation of the different layers I havee been playing with. I have layer out my process below and included an earlier image of the work in progress so you have a sense of the journey.
The background is a colour play to prompt me to find the figure in the shapes that emerge. I work best when I allow myself to listen and just follow my inner muse.as she takes shape I layer the chrysanthemum stamp, add a page from an old guide book with a beautiful old style house, more stamps on pattern tissue and a section of patterned serviette. I use a roller and some green paint to lightly roll over the images and help them unify. I also add some nickel azo gold through the background. These 2 colours act as strong in fires throughout the piece. This creates my base. From here I block in the facial tones and check placement. Now the new step of using the fan brush and Titan buff to mute the hues, I go back in with pencil while the paint is wet and re-establish and refine facial detail. She is working now. I add quinacrydine nickel azo gold to the quinacrydine red hair base and white lines to add flow. The flowers in her hair are painted white and quinacrydine nickel azo gold is added in the centre. I add a red lace sticker tape to form the lace of her dress and overpaint it. She has a real sense of flow. I darken the edges with a sponge and paynes grey. The contrast isn’t right so I come back into the background with green to strengthen the composition. I add the word ‘wings’, with home made alphabet stamps, as she has a lovely sense of movement as if she is flying or dancing or both.
I feel like these last few pieces have been lessons in how to allow and go with the process. An acknowledgment that it doesn’t matter if you obscure an area. In fact this is sometimes what is needed to allow the image to emerge fully. These images are ment to be layered explorations and each layer adds a depth and strength to the image. I have definitely explored techniques in these works that have inspired me and I will use them in future. I love art because I never stop discovering knew things (and old things I have forgotten about) and that keeps it fresh and exciting.