The Biker

Yay! The Biker is finished!!!!!!
For those of you who have been following along with this piece, it's been a long time coming. I took special care to go at a slow and steady pace on this commission piece so that it remained a labor of love and not a chore. It has taught me a few things along the way, one of the greatest of which has been patience!
So, it is done. I am well pleased and I do hope the client is as well.

g,Breath of Life

This painting is multi-layered and quite beautiful in person showing much depth not seen in the photo. It is dedicated to my friend Gabriel who signs all her correspondence with a "g".
In the background is a the god head blowing the breath of life into the cosmos, vaguely seen at the center point of the point of the crystals. The three crystals are the trinity of course. and the cosmos and all the spirit selves are in the whole of the background.

Even though I just met you, I knew you. Even though you have left, I shall see you again.

Abstract Angel

I had the privilege to teach a mother daughter duo in my studio yesterday and we did abstract angels. The daughter was only 7 yrs old and she did very well with this technique. The background was too hard for her so she painted hers in but mother and I did this background that you see here with cheese cloth. We pushed the various paint colors through the mesh onto the canvas and of course it left a lovely course pattern in the background for our Angels.
The Angela were "wet painted". That's a term I may have made up. Apply your colors very rapidly with a wet brush dipped into the paints, dragged onto the canvas, then lightly sprayed with a water mister. It will run to give a nice runny misty effect. To stop the process at any point from running anyfurther, simply lay the canvas flat to dry. We did blow dry the background before applying the angels. However, do not blow dry the misted Angels or the lovely drops will get splayed in different directions and ruin the downward drip effect. Unless of course, that's what you want ; )
Hope you try this Wet Painted technique!

The Painted Bra Project

The Painted Bra Art Project

The Painted Bra Art Project is to raise awareness for breast cancer. Breast Cancer awareness month is October. The purpose of the FB page is encourage artists to paint a bra. We will use the FB page to display the painted bras and possibly create an auction during October and donate the money to the American Cancer Society. Please email a picture of your painted bra to annabraden@comcast.net by 6 September 2011 or sooner. That will allow enough time to get all the pictures loaded and several weeks to promote our exhibit. Thanks and have fun painting bras!!

My sister Jamie is a breast cancer survivor , Yay! So you know I jumped all over this little project. So... Much... Fun...! Very tough to paint on a bra though. I didn't have any kind of manikin or seamstress dummy thing to place the bra on while painting. I had a box. Ya, that's right, a box. So. I stretched that bra around the box and said, " Hmmmm, just what do I see? " Then I knew, Freedom from cancer represented by a butterfly! Just as the butterfly struggles and transforms itself from the chrysalis only to burst free, so to is our greatest hope for the cancer patient to unfurl their wings and be free from cancer too. One way or the other, our women folk do become free and fly from those strangleholds of cancer. Either to fly home with the angels or to our earth homes and continue with the message to all her sisters that this disease can be beat.
So this little project is to help carry the message for our sisters and raise some funds too.

Cherries

This little painting is for my September painting class I do believe.
My grand daughter had the job of pitting a bunch of cherries and she did a very good job of it too I might add. She pulled out a pair of joined cherries and proclaimed them twins and said I was to paint them! So, here they are.

Progress notes

Back to progress on this biker painting. Thought I forgot about it didn't ya?! Well, a little here a little there, I've been working on this painting all the time. Last night I finished the paparazzi on the right hand side. Now to finish them on the left! As you can see they are just basically roughed in on the left. I really have painted them twice! I know , I know! Seems like a lot of work to do it that way doesn't it? But I really wanted to make sure that the crowd was were I wanted them and if I wanted to move them around I could do that at this stage, no problem. They will stay faded in the back in the background though I'm thinking. At least for now. Remember, the main character has yet to make an appearance, The Biker! So, we need to save all the drama for him. He gets main stage.
okay, back to painting.........