Thursday, April 09, 2009

THE WALLFLOWER SERIES #1

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Wallflower Boy
Original Mixed Media on Canvas
approximately 8 x 9 inches
My muse has me fixated again on paper collages and particularly on transfer techniques. I have had to spend so much time on the computer over the winter with my art course, I've really missed getting my hands and fingers in paint and gel , etc.
It's very hard to see the texture in this. I transferrred the images onto canvas having developed a new trade secret transfer method that actually works! I then hand painted the flowers with Golden liquid acrylics and finally painted the background with a heavy bodied acrylic. The finished look is far more textural in person. I added the Sanskrit symbols "Om MaNi Pad Me Hung" intermittently for good luck. For those of you unfamiliar with Buddhism, each repetition is meant to symbolize (simply stated) the end of human suffering. I thought about adding more layers in the backgrounds but decided I liked the amount of white space. To my eye it makes the actual composition stand out more with the end result appearing more contemporary.

Here's a 'mock-up' of how I imagine it might look matted and framed. It would be approximately 13 x 13 inches framed like this.

Available on Etsy.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

When you go to the full size of the collage, you can see lots of texture. It's amazing!

The man looking right out at us seems to grab our attention.Love the symbolism you added.

When are you going to let us in on your new transfer technique? It looks like it's a good one.

Cindy McMath said...

Trudi, your wallflower people are fantastic.

Would love to hear more about the transfer technique - they are so often hit and miss (and mostly miss).

You should probably hold out and write a book or teach a class though!

Your blog is very inspiring - you're living my dream and going to art school! Maybe one day (sigh).

Cindy :)

Cory said...

First time visiting your blog...you are doing lovely work. I really like the wallflower series, and...your drawings are amazing.