Monday, March 11, 2013

"Believe" Mixed Media Canvas

I can't seem to stop making mixed media canvases with lots of texture. I tried really hard to stay away from the modeling paste on this canvas, but apparently I just couldn't help my self.


Fun with stencils!
So this canvas started out with a mixture of acrylic paints and spray inks. I really wanted to make an art piece similar to this one, but with a little bit of a twist. So my next step was to bust into our tape stash and cover the canvas with random tape strips.
All taped up and no where to go
Next I used some white acrylic paint over the top. The idea was that the spaces would be white, leaving the painted spaces under the tape. However I didn't take two things into consideration with my brilliant plan.

1. Spray inks continue to react even after they've dried.
 I ended up with a pastel green/blue instead of the bright white that I wanted.

2. Electrical tape makes a really bad mask.
 The red tape above was some electrical tape I had handy. It didn't seal correctly, so the white paint seeped under the tape, messing up my clean lines.
A pretty pastel, but not really what I was going for.
So after I pulled the tape off the canvas, I tried to figure out how to salvage this piece of art. I decided to do what I do best- build up layers and layers of texture using modeling paste. I also used Distress re-inkers to draw on the canvas and added some bubble wrap stamping. The final touches were some painted cardboard strips and chipboard letters.
So much texture!


So I guess the moral of my story is that 1. It is really hard to resist the siren call of the texture paste and 2. If you've messed up on a piece of art, more layers of paint and texture will fix that right up.