A few weeks ago, on the way back from my physio, I came across this elderly man walking his dogs. Two white dogs. They were so similar except in sizes with one smaller than the other. So cute! Even cuter was how they were briskly patting along the path in tiny steps with their tiny legs. And then I made a mental note to paint about this. Always fun to find kawaii things like that to be inspired by!
Pastel Sketching
So first a little sketch. I grabbed my Strathmore’s Mixed Media Sketchbook and drew my little doggies with my oil pastels in grey. Then with some soft pastels I began my background. Just randomly adding shapes and squiggles to see what would happen when I add my acrylic inks over it.
Layering with Paint
With two shades of blue acrylic inks (Azure Blue and Cobalt Blue) and two shades of green (Phtalo Green and Permanent Green Light), I began painting the background. Interesting to see that some of the soft pastels are still visible, especially on the grass area. All the inks are from Sennelier which I recommend due to their heavy pigmentation and vivid shades.
Adding Collages
It is always great to experiment! I then glued on some colored tissue papers in yellow and light blue, even overlapping the doggies to see what would happen. The transparency of the collage papers gave a further cool effect to the painting. Actually, I’m starting to get more interested in collaging with tissue paper and paper napkins as they certainly lift up to an otherwise dull painting. I recently bought a series of patterned paper napkins, but plain ones are also great to use as I’ve done here.
Another Layer of Paint
I did like the colours of the background but I felt more could be done, especially to cover the yellow collage paper a bit. For the sky, I layered up with some Marine Blue but seeing how dark it turned out, I covered it with a mixture of Cobalt Blue and tapped on some Light Blue Heavy Acrylic by Golden and some Iridescent Blue acrylic paint by Old Holland. As for the grass, I also went for some Heavy Acrylic and Iridescent paint, in Light Green by Golden and Iridescent Bronze by Old Holland, respectively. The doggies were then painted in Titanium White but thinned down with some acrylic medium to ensure translucency. Finally, I went over the outlines with some grey coloured pencil to reinforce them. And here we are now!
So another typical mixed media painting! Here I further experimented with various shades of the same colours of blue and green which gave some dimension to the background. Adding collages of colored tissue papers further enhanced the effect. I’m glad this all worked well, and now the kawaii little doggies look as if they are thoroughly enjoying their walk on this green but almost-autum grass!
My Kawaii Quarter 