Two new/old gothic arches. I found these while I was purging the working projects piles. They aren’t much to look at being just a couple of experiments with background creation techniques.
The birds and flowers was based on a piece of paper towel that I had used as a wiper for water colors in another project. I added more color by dropping leftovers from the palette onto the towel and then let it run and dry without interference. Instead of cutting the background out with scissors I used a fine pointed brush and ran a bead of dark brown watercolor around the shape I wanted and when the towel was damp through both layers I pulled the it apart along the water line. It made a nice tonal background to which I added some wall paper cutouts and feather from my parrot.
The balloons was an experiment in using gesso in making backgrounds. I collaged paper and then stamped images on the background. When the inks had dried I put a thin layer of gesso over the entire surface. I put cutouts and a bit of string on the top.
Gesso does give an interesting texture to what goes on top if it. Also a good deal of “tooth” if you want to work with something like pastels or crayons. But I don’t think I’ll be using it much. It just makes everything too muted.
The borders are metallic pens that I had just bought. The red is a brush pen from Pentel. it takes a lot of coats to get a good coverage. (Red and green ones are commonly on sale around Xmas.) The gold is Krylon’s gold leafing pen. This one is worth hunting for. A few tips. Shake before using — a lot. Run a test line of about 4 inches on scrap paper to get the ink flowing well. You’ll get a very consistent line after that. Work in a well ventilated room — this thing stinks of it’s solvent. (Propylene Glycol Monomethyl Ether.)
The caption “Stolen Kisses Require an Accomplice” is by Texas Bix Bender. (A name I could vote for.)
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