Gorgeous Garden Dress

Little One is so cute! And resourceful as well. She came across a roll of green and turquoise tie-dye satin material at a charity shop. “So stunning and such a pity to waste”, she mused, “I think I’m going to make something pretty with it! And so she went about cutting and sewing up a sweet-looking costume she can wear at garden parties. Comes with bunny ears too! How adorable is that. So adorable in fact that of course I had to paint about it!

And How Did That Start?

It all begins with a watercolor painting I had started with Dr Ph Martin’s Radiant Concentrated Water Colors. I was attempting to paint a landscape of mountains by the lake but unfortunately it didn’t come out as I was hoping. Rather than throw the whole painting away to waste, though, why not recycle it for another artwork? And hence the painting was torn to bits and randomly glued onto a page from Canson’s A3 Media Paper pad (300 gsm). Just as Little One recycled the material she had gotten at the charity shop, I recycled this unwanted painting too!

Getting Further Creative

Once I got started and began adding colors and bits of collage paper as background, I drew my character, Little One. The rest of the process didn’t come easily though. It was a process of trial and error, layer after layer, covering bits I didn’t like and getting innovative with the “beautiful mistakes”. I even went through a few “ugly phases” and had to abandon the paining for a few days, work on something else and then return to it. In the end though, I made it, as the rest followed through smoothly. Even one of the collage papers incidentally resembled a snail shape, as we see here. Naturally that allowed me to develop the idea of a magic garden!

Mediums Used

A this is a mixed media painting, a variety of art supples was used. Firstly I scribbled a bit on the background with crayons before layering on with colored wrapping tissues, acrylic inks in blue and pearlescent green and violet as well as Liquitex heavy body acrylics in cobalt blue and emerald green. And we love fluorescent pink in acrylic, gouache, markers. Textures were also created, including paint-soaked kitchen paper for the collar, modeling paste for the hair and quite a few glitter!

See what amazing things you can recreate with “unwanted” artwork? Here is a good example of one, and although the process came with a few challenges, I am proud of myself now for persevering. And meanwhile, doesn’t Little One looking so cute in her new dress she had made herself? Amazing talent too!