Morels 2 ~ complete

And here is the finished painting all float mounted and framed and ready for a buyer. If you like what you see let me know. If not this will probably go to the gallery. In the meantime I've started work on the next work of art. This time I think I'll be painting trilliums and I've got an interesting palette chosen. Actually it's a entirely new approach, new to me that is.

Morels WIP 2

A quick update on this project. I chose a palette of DS Quin. Burnt Orange, DS Quin. Sienna, olive green, DS Undersea green, warm sepia, Phthalo blue and Perm yellow. I wanted more saturated color for this morel painting. After the painting was complete I added copper metallic paste here and there for a more exciting effect. I used my finger to apply. This stuff is new in my tool kit and I love it. I used the paste primarily to highlight all the yummy textures. I just finished giving the painting a light coat of Krylon spray varnish and when it's dry I will add the 'feet' to the back of my substrate as I plan to float mount this in my frame.

In this image you can see my collection of metallic pastes.

I tried spring green on for 'size' but quickly nixed that idea. Love the remaining colors.

Morels and Bookmarks

I've got two 11" x 14" shadow boxes that I've wanted to use for paintings so I chose to use morel mushrooms for my subject, at least in one of the boxes. I'm taking a similar approach to a painting I created back in 2011. I've coated a piece of matboard with Liquitex gesso and added bits of leaves and twigs to replicate a forest floor. I also coated some oak leaves I saved from last Fall. Oak leaves are the best leaves I've found for this application because they are sturdy and pliable, even when dried. I will attach those with gel medium. I also tried out a new medium...string gel. I used it to form the mushrooms and give them a 3D appearance. The string gel was surprisingly easy to work with and I can imagine all sorts of projects I could use it for.

I found myself with lots of scrap Yupo and I hate wasting art materials so I made about a dozen bookmarks with the bits and pieces. I think they turned out rather well!

Julie's Morels~Complete

SOLD

I just completed this and I'm pretty happy with the outcome. I stayed with my original palette and continued to play until I was satisfied. It's fairly easy to adjust color on gesso as the surface isn't terribly absorbent so lifting is easy. I'll probably wind up float mounting this in a black frame.

Julie's Morels~WIP 1

Two things came together to inspire this piece..morel hunting season(soon to arrive here in northern Michigan) and an idea I recently hatched to embed leaves and grass in gesso to create texture. I love working on gesso with watercolor and I love lots of texture.

Julie Christianson is a fabulous local photographer and I've known her for many years. She had posted an image on Facebook of a morel she snapped, probably last hunting season. Since I can no longer traipse through the woods to hunt them myself I asked her if I could use some of her images as references and she generously obliged. For my visitors that have never heard of a morel mushroom I found this on Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morchella

I'm working on matboard, the size is small...roughly 5" x 7". I applied a light coat of Liquitex acrylic gesso to the board and used a palette knife to create some background texture. Then I coated dry leaves in gesso and applied them to the board while it was still wet. Today I added a second coat of gesso thinned with a little water and let that dry. Afterward I penciled in my mushrooms and protected them with masking fluid. My palette so far consists of DS Undersea green, DV raw umber, DS Quin gold deep and a little Prussian blue.

Mushies~ Finished & Framed

It's interesting what can be done with palette muck so don't waste it! I took the liberty of matting and framing this one online just to see how it would look. I chose a dark wood frame so it doesn't show up well on the blog.