I hope to be ready to do another class soon! Past week or so I’ve been under the weather, recently testing positive for Covid like thousands of others in this country. No biggie. Just a stuffy nose now, coughing stopped and no fever. Energy levels have been so low though that I couldn’t even focus on painting. Now that’s not me at all! As the symptoms subside, I now share a cute mixed media piece I worked on a few weeks ago whilst following Juliette Crane’s Serendipity I Classes, this unit being “Trying to Paint What’s in Your Head”. And what fun that was!
Preparing the Background
Juliette describes this class as “In this project we’re going to take more elements from our past work to strengthen our style. But instead of focusing primarily on visual elements, we will be focusing on developing a feeling.” On our canvas board, we begin by painting random blocks of color. I used some Rangers Dylusion’s Paint which are actually acrylic paint used for crafting. I bought the jars many years ago but decided to upgrade to a more professional set of paints but rather than throwing away the old stuff, I just try and finish them up especially as they get covered up later anyway. Plus, I love the colors! Once dry, we proceed in glueing on some collages. As you can see here, I tore up bits of scrap mulberry paper, used up palette papers, Japanese-language newspaper and pages from my Dutch grammar book no longer needed. Adds some flavor to my paintings!
Adding the Subjects
More collages continued being added including wrapping tissues and patterned paper napkins. And now I was ready to go for my subjects! Somehow, I thought that purple rectangle with a bit of pink collage paper could develop into the figure of a downward facing pony. The pony was then painted in Quinacridone Azo Nickel Gold. See how the back legs still show some patterns from the underlying layer! I then decided to emulate Juliette’s painting a bit and get Little One to be princess and pose in front of the pony , thus adding a cut-out circle made of newspaper for her face. The rest then flowed in: I sketched in her robe, the shape of the pony and painted the surrounding background in Green-Gold. Face and hair colored in. Seeing it’s been a while since I last used modelling paste, I thought this was a perfect opportunity to add some texture to the hair. Then the crowns for both the pony and Princess Little One were then added. How cute!
Further Developing
So far very happy with how it was all falling in place. The moon and cloud were added with the sky in a dark shade than usual: Prussian Blue is stunning! Then I colored the moon in Hansa Yellow Light and for the cloud, I combined Marine Blue with some Titanium White. A few colors were attempted for the background mountains including green and orange but in the end I settled for Quinacridone Magenta which gives this serene mood and blends well with the Prussian Blue Sky. The house was then colored in grey. More texture was then added to the painting by introducing some Liquitex glass beads on the Princess’ crown; once dry, more gold paint was covered on top. Then the robe: I went for some origami paper here, a very pretty pink flowery pattern that compliments very beautifully with the theme. Pony’s crown was then matched with some neon pink, which was also the color with which the cloud was lined in order to balance the painting more. Getting cuter!
Finishing Touches
And here comes the exciting part! Embellishing the painting with glitter and bling! First some details on the grey house using some white Molotow marker. I wanted to make it simple so as not to upstage the princess and pony. Princess’ eyes first traced with some black glitter pen, followed by some copper glitter glue on the lashes. Then pony’s eyes were doodled in before introducing silver glitter lashes. Her pink crown was also lined with some pink glitter glue. Back to Princess, her robe was completed by having a pair of pink sequins glued on, with the sleeves tapped on with the pink glitter glue. And finally, the Pony’s mane and tail! I got the idea when I found some stringy edges from orange mulberry paper, perfect for this purpose. Now that’s what I call texture! And of course I can definitely say this is all complete.
Of all the paintings I’ve done whilst following Juliette Crane’s classes, I have to say this is the best one I’ve done. It could also be that I am getting more accustomed to them. Sometimes her classes can be quite intense as there is quite a lot to take in. Lots of layering, variety of mediums and at the same time making the painting as lively and whimsical as possible. Nevertheless I enjoy them! Writing this blog has given me a bit of a boost and encouraged me to try a new class again soon. Tomorrow I hope to have the energy to resume where I left off. And looking at this kawaii painting is certainly helping!
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My Kawaii Quarter 