Found Art Tuesday: Simple 2-5-08

A little late is better than never. You can quote me on that! So with this little work, I tried to kill 3 birds with one stone. I belong to a mixed media group, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LatestTrendsCSWorkshop, that is currently doing some of the techniques/excercises from "Celebrate Your Creative Self " by Mary Todd Beam. http://www.amazon.com/Celebrate-Your-Creative-Self-Exercises/dp/1581801025. I love this format of doing an excercise every month because it forces me to revisit many of the techniques I may have done long ago. It also allows me or perhaps gives me permission to make big mistakes. The assignment for February was two basic techniques: lifting, and wax resist.

The found art theme this past week: Simple. So I set out to do two techniques using the theme simple. I should have known from the start it would be anything but simple! Look at these colors...I seem to always choose this warm pallette. Anyway. In Mary Todd Beam's excercise, she has us using watercolors. OK so I currently prefer acrylics. When lifting, you have to move quickly for obvious reasons. Acrylics dry so fast. Illustration board was my support. Diacrylide yellow and yellow ochre were laid down first and lifted, I tried lifting with a foam brush and discovered that I did not like the foam brush at all so I used paper towels which is what I would normally use to lift paints. Then I laid down two collage elements. The skull was a third try transfer. I tried twice before and the transfer just was not working on this illustration board. I think that maybe it was too wet? I do transfers often and this was the first time in a long while that I could not get one to work. The wax resist technique is more subtle. I did not use the technique as a focal point but rather as a way to protect some of my elements before I painted over them with more colors. I used neutral shoe polish and some white crayon. Then I washed over the work with quincridone crimson, burnt umber light. Next I added the final collage element, shoe polish, and another couple layers of burnt umber light. The last wash was an irridescent bronze. Last but not least, I added some writing using Roas'a little find...the Kemper tool..

Although this is rather winded, I wanted to write this up for the mixed media group who are currently doing this excercise. As far as the found art theme...the work really is not very complex. If the transfer had worked the first time, it would have been "simple." So I included some writing that says "there is no simpler road". So there you have it.

K