I am a painter

This can look as a very bold and brave statement, after just one painting finished, but I believe in the magic of the words, and if the words are spoken and set out into the Universe - they become true and start a whole machinery of happenings to justify what was said.
I knit so I am a knitter and I paint - so I am a painter (among millions of other things I am! *^v^*).


My painting adventure started in my teenage years, when I got a box of oils and a canvas from my father for Christmas. He even constructed me an easel. ^^ I had no idea what I was doing, but I painted a picture - a person standing on the beach, looking over the stormy sea.
It was a crap.
I know you are not supposed to judge your creations like this, but from the technical point of view - it was terrible. I had no knowledge of the way to use oils, how to draw human figure, how to place shades on water and the sky... It didn't want to get dry (now I know the oil paints can dry even for 6 months, but then I was just getting more and more impatient with them... ^^).
The painting landed on a closet and I didn't bother myself with oils anymore.

When I've started to create an art journal recently, I thought about coming back to painting. I didn't choose oils, but watercolours and acrylics, as the easier media (for me).
For my birthday present for my best friend I started with an idea in my head, about Anna being so much into Gothic climates, and her beloved dog, and how I'd like to present them both, and what techniques I'd like to use.

I made a sketch first, then shaded the face and the body with watercolour crayons and did all the first layers - the floor, the curtains, the green wall. Then I started to add more layers with stamps and scraps of paper and a piece of lace, and work on the detailing.

Here is the final version:


I learned a lot while working on this painting - how acrylics behave with added water and without it, what I can do with a crayon, how different surfaces show the paints and the crayons, that a varnish does not smear the painting (this was my biggest fear! ^^).
The painting has been done on a canvas stretched over the wooden frame, so I painted also the sides of it.
Details:
- cotton canvas on a wooden frame 35 cm x 45 cm
- a piece of watercolour paper glued on the canvas for the hight effect
- watercolour crayons
- acrylic paints (Renesans)
- scraps from the short story "The Cask of Amontillado" by Edgar Allan Poe
- white lace
- self-made rubber stamps for the pattern effects
- date stamp
- acrylic varnish I like the hight effect of the thick watercolour paper I placed over the canvas and I think I'll use it in the future paintings, too. Also the difference between the super smooth surface of the paper and the bumpy surface of the canvas is almost sculptural.
There are lots of colours and patterns, and that's what I like about this painting - it's so vibrant and heterogeneous, being me - I couldn't make anything else. ^^ And I'm really happy to send it away from home because I can feel more to come, so when handing it to Anna tomorrow I won't regret seeing it go.
And yes, I said "future paintings", because I want to paint more, and I even started another piece already. *^v^*


This morning a postman brought me my prize from the art shop - a small box of watercolours - they are too cute!...
They are called a pocket box paints because they really are a pocket size, plus a paper pad and a water bag - how cool is that?!... *^v^*
Now I'll just have to fight my "I'm so scared to start using this because it's so professional and new, and..." fear! *^v^*