50 Canvases in 2014: Art for the Bathroom

This week, my challenge project is posted on wonderstrange!

http://www.wonderstrange.com/living-with-art-vintage-first-aid-kit/

50 Canvases in 2014: Make It Yours Challenge

Last week's challenge over on wonderstrange was to draw your favorite cartoon or comic character(s), but in your own style.

I did the PowerPuff girls,who shall reign with equal glory forever in the City of Townsville and the Kingdom of Amazing.  Here's my version:

There's a video of me painting the canvas right over here, if that's the kind of thing that winds your watch.  Or fights your bad guys.  Or spills your Chemical X.

50 Canvases in 2014: Text Challenge

This week was my son's last week of middle school.  An organized mother would have had teacher gifts and photo shoots, or at the minimum, a crystal clear understanding of where the boy needed to be - and when - and with what (a cello, a tie, a toga, a bottle labeled "Nectar" for his Midsummer Night's Dream performance, whatever).  Alas, I am not an organized mother.  Let's just pretend that people who make life look easy are dull and unfulfilled, okay?

On to the art!  Earlier in the week, for a blog entry on wonderstrange, I created this background, which I ultimately thought of as a sort of whimsical storybook cover.  And who better to add to a storybook than Red Riding Hood, freshly rescued from her ordeal with the wolf?  I laid down the text to meet the text challenge from 50 Canvases in 2014 on wonderstrange.

I don't know if you can see the text in the pics, but it is faintly visible in places.  I am kind of ridiculously excited to have used red as a shadow color.  That's the type of thing I tend to like in other people's work but don't include in my own.

50 Canvases in 2014: Word Up!

This week has been nuttier than an Almond-Pecan torte!  After my friend Nancy left, my BFF and business partner Sarah arrived, and I think it took me two full days to recover from all of the late nights and the extra glasses of wine.  (Incidentally, I am perfectly happy with the entire aging process except for that part.  What do you mean, four hours of sleep will turn me into a zombie?!  I'm indestructible!  I'm indefatigable!  I'm . . . oh, wait.  I'm 42.  Never mind.  Totally destructible.)

I did manage to do a canvas while Sarah was here, and it was the "word" challenge on wonderstrange - namely, to create a canvas inspired by a word that isn't "hope," "believe," "faith," or any other word you can find on scores of other work.

My word was "both," because that's something I really need to work on.  I can have a day that is BOTH productive AND frustrating.  I can have an experience that is BOTH rewarding AND disappointing.  I do not have to pick one or the other.  I can embrace both.

50 Canvases in 2014: Atypical Color Challenge

I am doing the wonderstrange 50 Canvases in 2014 challenge, and last week's prompt called for the use of a color palette you wouldn't normally pick - or at least, that's the way I (mis)remembered it.  As it turns out, the prompt was to use an established palette - that is, to pick a palette before beginning the canvas and stick with it, all the way to the end.  Whoops.  Good thing I did that, too!  I just did it with a color palette I wouldn't normally use.  Seriously, this is so far outside my comfort zone that you need a passport and a long conversation with a customs agent to get from one to the other.

Parlais vous pinky-purple?

Okay, to keep everything else simple simple, I decided to work on a 4x4 black canvas, and I made myself a pensive little alien.  I am pleased to report that I had a ball!

The flash really changes the way the colors look!

Before I painted the background, by the way, I Googled some images from the Hubble telescope.  The image I chose was associated with an article called, "Galaxy 'Spills Its Guts' in Space."  Who can resist a tell-all galaxy?!  Secrets of the Universe, come sit by me!

50 Canvases in 2014: Song Lyric Prompt

Last weekend, I saw Rhett Miller perform at Radio Radio, and he was super amazing and energetic and adorable, on top of which, he put his arm around me, which shows him to be a man of taste and discernment.  Or a man who was taking a picture with me.  WHATEVER.

Rhett.  You can also see my hair, but the rest of me didn't look so hot.  Hi hair!

Anyway, the whole experience got me extra fired up to paint a canvas for last week's wonderstrange 50 Canvases in 2014 challenge, which was to paint something inspired by a song lyric.  Of all Rhett's many brilliant lines, I chose these:

Happy.  Baby, I'm so happy.  Baby, I'm so.  I got my imaginary friends.

And if you don't love me, would you please pretend?

Here's a parade of progress pics for the mixed media canvas those lyrics inspired:

By the way, those dominoes-style numbers above her head?  They are 4 and 5 (which make 9) and 1 and 6 (which make 7).  Rhett is the lead singer of the Old 97s.  GET IT?  Yes.  Ahem.

Good night.