Acrylic splat becomes a toucan

I have to say that I am so excited. I’ve had a crazy day at work with lots of exciting things happening, big changes and developments in the Libraries being backed up by a huge pile of work and several learning curves to clamber up. So I came home frazzled and tired. I had planned to vegetate in front of the television, but wandered into my studio instead.

Yesterday I discovered Michelle Kral‘s work and in particular one of her videos (as I posted yesterday) and I was really inspired by her technique. So I thought, ‘what the hell’ and sat down to play.

I dug out some watercolour paper and my fluid acrylics. I think Michelle works in watercolour, but I’m more familiar with acrylics, I had the urge to layer on layer, and I’m not as confident doing that with watercolours. I also dug up some thin viscocity acrylic medium which previously I had no idea what to do with and suddenly realised that it would be perfect for thinning the fluid acrylics down without using so much water (which can be a not so good thing as too much water in acrylics can prevent the paint from forming a proper film when it dries and consequently it can flake off or do some other artwork ruining antic).

I started splatting and scribbling with my brush, a little dribbling, dotting, and dabbing with my paint rag. Then my iridescent medium entered the scene (I am hung up on that stuff lately, I love it), followed by iridescent white. Splat, scribble, dab, dab, I just poked at it for a while, not really sure what I could do with it, trying to get that vibrant feel that Michelle managed.

At one point I discovered a long bent triangle shape and the concept of a toucan came to mind. I had been working in landscape, so I turned it to portrait and suddenly the picture coalesced in my head.

Toucan, acrylics on waterclour paper, approx. 297 x 420 mm.

I finished it off with thinned acrylic white and my ruling pen. Sorry about the poor photograph, but because of the iridescence it is really hard to photograph. I might give it another go tomorrow with sunlight (it is midnight here at the moment).

So a totally new style and experience for me…yay! And quick! Only took me a couple hours max (in comparision to some of my other works which can take days or weeks). This could be for sale! (And yes, that is a scary statement for me :D)

The biggest thing for me that I’m learning at the moment is to trust my skill. I have to believe that no matter what I do it will work out somehow. It may look like crud at some points, but if I keep going, I can make it work. I’m an artist, I can do this! (This is my mantra…and it is working :D).

Here’s wishing all of us a fantastic and arty weekend.

Best wishes,
Liz
(happy la-la)