Secret Garden Watercolor, completed

The painting is now fully completed, as it has been mounted and attached to the ceiling tin. I'm very pleased with the overall look of the piece, I think the ceiling tin makes a beautiful background and frame for the painting.

First the painting was cut into an octagonal shape, as was the backing that it would be mounted on. My husband was the one that did all this...as anything that requires precision cutting and accuracy is not for me. It took him an hour to cut both pieces and attach the painting to the sticky surface of the mounting board. He then had to notch the edges of the painting and fold everything over. The painting was then attached to the ceiling tin and had to cure for 24 hours before I could get a look at it.

The final result is something I'm very pleased with! This piece is available for sale at my ESTY shop. http://www.artfulcreations.etsy.com/

Secret Garden Watercolor, Finished

Well, the painting itself is complete now, I was able to finish painting it last night. Funny enough, it took about 2 hours messing around a lot with the watercolor paint, to finish the butterfly the way I wanted it. I then spattered the area surrounding the butterfly with white and purple as I wanted it to look very magical. My last task was to put a slight shadow under the dress area, to anchor the main subject to the painting. I could have gone further with shadows but really didn't want to, I wanted the whole painting to be loose and free looking, as if it just kind of "happened" that way.

Even though the painting is finished, it's not fully done. The painting will get sprayed with a protective coating now. I will probably then let it sit for a good 5 to 7 days before touching it, so the surface can fully cure. Then it will get cut into its octagonal shape and mounted. After that, the painting will be hung inside the antique ceiling tin that my husband Chris painted a few weeks ago (see below) then it will be fully finished and ready to go.

Secret Garden Watercolor, Progress

I'm very excited at this point because just a few more things and I will be finished! I actually keep running down into my basement with the watercolor and placing it on the ceiling tin so I can see what it will look like when it is all finished and framed on the tin.

As you can see, the flowers on the left have been totally painted in. I actually meant to post again before I got so much of the lady done but I guess I was on a roll and couldn't stop myself from painting. I decided to make her a redhead. I'll tell you, out of all the hair colors to paint, I think red is the hardest....I had to combine a lot of different colors until I got a red I was happy with .

There will also be something at the end of her hand, it wont just be a stump. I plan to put a butterfly there, it will be resting on her wrist, so her hand will be behind the butterfly and you will not see it. I'm experimenting on scrap canvas pieces right now, trying to get the right feel for the butterfly I would like to put there, I'm trying a bunch of different techniques so I can try to create the effect that I want. At this point, when I'm so close to being finished, it would be a crime to get sloppy and just put any old butterfly in there, I need to take my time with it, making sure I create one I'm happy with.

Secret Garden Watercolor, Background

Now that the first steps have been completed successfully, it was time to lay down my background for this watercolor. I did a wet on wet technique for the background and tried to use all of my favorite colors to paint with. The background at this point, probably looks strange to you being that the painting has just gotten its start. It will all make sense though, as the main character gets filled in along with the rest of the flowers around her getting finished. I created the background in a very loose, free style to go along with what I wanted this painting to convey. When the painting is done, it will be cut in an octagonal shape as I mentioned in my last post and the center of the ceiling tin will serve as its frame.

The background being painted right over my drawing, left it a bit hard for me to see what I had sketched out so, I had to go back and pencil in the lines again. I could have started with the lady or the flowers that surround her and I just felt like starting with the flowers so that is what I did. The ones on the right as you can see, are fully finished. The flowers on the left, have just been basecoated in and need to be worked on quite a bit more. The lady in the middle is hard to distinguish at this point but by my next post, we'll start to see her take shape. First I'll finish the rest of the flowers and then move onto her.

Before I close my post for the day, I want to say a VERY BIG THANK YOU to Sharon of http://www.cest-chouettehome.com/ she is responsible for the new look of my blog. I wanted to have a blog that matched my website more correctly and Sharon jumped in and not only offered her help, she did the whole thing for me. Sharon, thank you so much, it looks great and is exactly what I wanted.

Secret Garden Watercolor

This is the very beginning of a new fantasy painting I'm working on, I've already decided to name it "Secret Garden" . I actually started it a couple of weeks back and have gotten quite far on it, this is my first installment though, so I can take you through step by step with what is going on.

First you'll notice the ceiling tin above, this will be the frame for my fantasy watercolor. It is a large tin, measuring 22" x 22"and the center is an octagon shape and is where I'll be placing the painting when it is done. The painting will actually be octagonal in shape to fit into the center medallion. I think by the time it is said and done, it should be a real show piece in the antique frame.

First, my husband (generous soul that he is) has done all the work on the ceiling tin, it had about a million layers of paint which he has removed (not a fun or easy process) and at this point, it is spray painted with a lovely cream color. I have to show that in another post....

This painting is being done on canvas and as you can see from the next photo, (which will be causing eye strain once again, sorry) it is blocked off in an octagonal shape. In this painting, a lady in a fantasy garden is reaching up to hold a butterfly. There are flowers on both sides of her that I don't really think you can see at this point. Being a fantasy painting, proportion can really go out the window if it suits my purposes and it does for this painting. The flowers that surround her are almost as tall as she is. She is actually not a little person, rather, someone of average size who is in a giant fantasy garden that surrounds her. More to come on my progress over the next few days.