Wish Big- Mixed Media Canvas for ColourArte

Hello Dear Friends

Today I have a mixed media canvas as a submission project for the ColourArte Design Team call.

I made a 8x10 canvas with a lot of handmade embellishments and recycled stuff...........

Here is a step-by-step pictorial for making your own canvas.......... I started with a pre- primed canvas in 8"x10" and used Mini Specimen stencil by crafters workshop and the texture pattern by Faber-Castell.............

Have used Texture paste in black and white to create the texture using a spatula..........

Used heavy Gel medium to attach a lot of found objects and handmade flowers in cold porcelain clay, metal, sea shells, beads etc to create a cluster on the left hand top corner............added drywall tape for some more texture..............

The right hand bottom corner has a computer part as the base, an ice-cream stick to create a shelf and a glass sample perfume bottle ...........I love the texture and design on the Versace bottle and was saving it for a special project .........I wrapped twine on the MDF sentiment 'Wish big' from Craftslane and created texture using my finger and texture paste on the sentiment.........a close up of the bottom cluster with shells, bling, chunky glitter and glass beads.............

All these flowers are handmade, Each and every bit adds to the texture in the end and the metallic colors show off every teeny tiny piece of dimension beautifully.........so I mixed clay and metal,glass and wooden beads, faceted bling and micro beads, found objects, keys,nuts and bolts..........
Another benefit is that you can use embellishments of any color as these get coated by black gesso so you can use your left over bits and pieces or any embellishments in colors you seldom use. I left this to dry naturally overnight .

The whole canvas gets coated in a generous layer of Black gesso, make sure to cover thoroughly.........Leave to dry completely.

After the layer of Black Gesso is dry comes the coloring part. I had ColorArte Silks Acrylic Glazes in four colors ie Apple Blossom, Lemon Drop, Sea Spray and Kiwi. I used the Silks and a combination of pearl and metallic acrylic colors to add life to my canvas !! Here it is after the first layer of color in Pearl metallic white.................

another layer ....see the textures coming to life ...........

After this came layers and layers of dry brushing the silks and other colors........

Just remember that your brush should be completely dry and take the minimum amount of color on the tip of a flat brush. This is quite a forgiving technique to get a wonderful effect and create a lovely piece of Art and you can give it a go even if you are not too confident of handling paints. In case your colors go wrong or your layers get too thick, you can give a coat of black again and restart.....so I would urge you to try it once :)

Here are some tips for the Dry Brushing Technique : 

1. Dry brushing technique involves using a paint brush that has a minimum amount of paint on it and using it to highlight textures and edges.2. It is best to use a flat brush for this technique.3. Keep your brush at a 90 degree angle and lightly brush edges or raised areas. Start with a light touch and gradually build color/layers.4. The secret to this technique is not to apply too much paint on your brush, it is a good idea to keep a spare paper on which you wipe your brush after taking paint on it before starting on your textured surface.

so after all that...........here is my final work......you can see I added some tiny acrylic butterflies here and there, removed the twine from my sentiment and added a little bird to my canvas.........

You can see the dimension here..................

I like the Versace bottle and the texture on the sentiment which is by using 3D metallic paints.All the sides of the canvas are textured, painted, highlighted and wrapped with 4 rounds of twine colored with the same metallic copper paint..............

Hope my lovely blogger friends and the awesome team at ColourArte likes this canvas of mine !!

linking to
http://mixedmediamc.blogspot.in/2015/07/mixed-media-monthly-challenge-14-summer.html...the yummy beads and the shells in the challenge graphic.

Please do leave your comments. I would love to read what you say and I would love to visit your blog too !!