Post 42: Starting to assemble things and working on backgrounds

   I started to lay the cutout images on the panels to make sure they would work and were sized properly. I am quite pleased with the way the first panel looks, and even without a finished background, I can tell the second one will look good too:

   The "Spit Textured"yellowish background and red lines are done on the third panel, and I am ready to do the background Celestial Chart drawings using White Carbon Paper and Graphite transfer Paper:

    I was mentioning the "Spit Texturing Technique " to a friend the other day, and got the wonderful suggestion that it was a way to place my DNA forever into the paintings. I love that idea. There is something to be done with that "Spit DNA" Concept. It would be easy enough to include the DNA of the buyer too, like a mark of ownership, sort of a Secret EX LIBRIS...

    Just for fun, I give you a peak at the mess on my huge 49"W x 14 ft L Studio Work Table, with my 55" Computor Monitor in the back. There is not a square foot of empty space. I still have to photograph all the new objects and file them in my Image Bank. 

   I clamped the other pieces, finished and in progress to the edge of the table so I can look at them as I am working on smaller pieces :

Post 41: Printing and Cutting Out the Elements of the Photo Collage

    It actually took me a good couple of days to measure and size the different elements of the collage. A few are single images, but most include several overlapping images, and have to be lined up and sized precisely.
     All the parts for the first two panels actually fit on a single 13"x19" sheet of matte paper. I like to add a few extra things to fill blank spaces, like extra insects, marbles, buttons, etc...

      It is a tight fit, and looks like a big jumble of things...

     Then comes the rather tedious, but somewhat zen like job of precisely cutting out all the pieces of the puzzle. The legs of insect are so small that I usually reenforce them with some white glue to keep them from braking, or reattach them if they already broke off. Same with the cords. I use a magnifier lamp for the smallest details.

    Then the white edges of the paper have to be colored with pastels so they blend in.

Post 40: On your marks, GO!

   I will be working on all three panels at the same time so the textures and tones match. It also should go faster.
   I created the light yellowish texture but rubbing in pigments, spitting, rubbing on multi colored light pastel sticks, spitting again, sprinkling watercolors with toothbrushes, sitting again and dabbing, rubbing darker shades of pastels some more lightly, sprinkling a weak Gum Arabic Solution, and finally spraying a finer mist of gum Arabic to fix the colors.

   Instead of using chalk to transfer the white patterns on the black areas and charcoal to transfer black patterns on light areas, I bought some white transfer paper and some graphite black transfer paper. The results are quite nice, and I am wondering whether to leave the lines as they are, or to redraw them with white and black pencils as my original intention was. I will do all three panels and decide later.

Post 39: Ready to Get Going!

       I started to build the three 18"x 18" panels for the first Tryptich with objects in niches:

      The Red Croquet Ball is actually much larger than the Top and the Pool Ball, so I decided to replace with a Red Pool Ball with an ivory dot, so the sizes of the niches would match at 2.75"x2.75"

    I built the niches in the 3 panels, gessoed them, and painted the "blackboard areas" with blackboard paint:

      Looking at the Photoshop mockup, I saw some possible improvements, added red lines to the side panels, moved things a bit, found a name for the brass plates, and for the tags. I also saturated the colors a bit and increased contrast. Here is the current Mockup of the "Red Top Tryptich":

Heavy Heart, Danger...                              Work for the Red, Top...                                 All Red, No Juice...     

         

Post 38: Back from Guatemala with Great Textures

   We spent the Holidays in Antigua, Guatemala with friends. It had been 10 years since our last trip, and it was great to be there again. We have been there quite a few times over the years and driven all over this fascinating country, with one of the richest textile tradition in the world. There is no denying  I have been influenced by this place, the colors, the walls, the old doors, the Santos.
   I took a camera with me strictly to collect textures of old walls to use as inspiration for backgrounds, and brought back hundreds of fabulous ones. Just as an example:

    I also photographed graves, windows, architectural details, doors and hardware:

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