Started on a new painting last night. I seem to do a variation of my piece Headaches every year or so. It's fun for me to remake the original concept and watch as my style evolves. This time with more eyes, foxes & stormy skies.
(This piece and the other foxy girls are going to be in a group show over at Project One next month + a third piece that I'll be starting soon.)
(Staring contest. Yes, she won.)
Today I started on the background and such, while listening to The Cranberries, like, all day.
So. While creating these wild-eyed nautical girls, I've been weaving this sort of vague backstory for them; how they're lives are interwoven, how they're connected, how they abhor and adore each-other. I originally was setting Delphine up to be a motherly figure to Ophelia and Aveline, but while the piece grew and developed, that path started to feel forced. I have several other images brewing in my mind, all tied in with their story line, and I started playing with the idea of all of them being sisters. I'm intrigued by the Greek myth of the constellation Pleiades, or the Seven Sisters, and decided to do a series loosely based around it.
So here we have Delphine, number three in my series The Seven Sisters.
The model for Delphine is my best friend Morgan of Whiteflowers. She wrote a beautiful song in collaboration, which I would love to share with you while you're visiting.
Here are some bits about my process for this piece.
As some of you know, a large portion of my creative process is the conceptualizing stage. This stage is really where the piece is really created, where I take a mental image and start drawing & combining elements together in Photoshop until I "find" it. Here is my "sketch" for Delphine. Naturally things change along the way, but I generally have the piece 90% planned out before I start painting. Of course I count on mistakes and bumps along the way to further shape the work.
I've become so comfortable working this way that I think it would be difficult to make up a painting on the spot. I know I would produce a completely different body of work if I was more spontaneous about it, which I'd like to explore more in the future. However, I do take my paintings very seriously, as they are a commitment, both time-wise & emotionally, so I suppose I save the spontaneity for my drawings and conceptualizing (for now).
So. I haven't played around with gold leaf much, so this was a fun experiment. I just sort of made up the process as I went along. I've recently fallen in love with Klimt and love the way he uses gold in his paintings, so I decided to try my hand at it.
After sketching out the figure, I stained the triangle portion black before applying the gold leaf, so bits of black would show through the cracks.
I definitely busted out the hairdryer at one point. I'm not really a fan of the "waiting for the paint to dry" game. (I consider myself a patient girl, but sometimes you just want to keep going with a project, especially when feeling inspired and gung-ho. Paint drying times can seriously disrupt my flow!!) Okay. So. Hairdryer. Yes. Then comes the leafing. Which is oddly relaxing. I didn't want the gold to be perfect, which is really hard to achieve anyway.
But seriously guys, gold leaf is so pretty in person!! Photos just don't do it justice. There are these really delicate and lovely cracks in the leaf which look beautiful with the black behind it, which you can't really see in the main picture. Also, she looks super weird at this stage. Before I start painting, I like to erase all the extra pencil marks from sketching the figure, otherwise the graphite can muddy up the paint. So all that's left when I start painting are the outlines of the face, etc.
The rest is just clockwork and takes time - applying layers upon layers of paint, until I'm happy with it.
Early stages of the tattoos.
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Well that's enough for now. Got a Jackie Kennedy painting I've gotta finish for a fun upcoming Warhol-themed show! Pics soon!
Also thanks to those who came out for my show the other night, it was fun times!
And Thank you for all the birthday love. You're the best.
xxx
Here's some previews of the piece I started the other day. My best friend Morgan is the model, as part of a collaboration. She wrote a beautiful song to go along with this, which I will share with you soon. I still have a lot of fine tuning to do on everything, as well as draw the tattoos and shipwrecks in her hair. But let me tell you, gold leaf is SO MUCH FUNNNNN. It's super shiny and pretty and half the time I just end up staring it.
It's looking very Klimt-y to me, guess gold leaf will do that ;)
and uhhh, here I am hanging out with her. looking tuff.
more soooon. but right now I'm redecorating my apartment and there is stuff EVERYWHEREEEEE. I'm not sure when I started spending more money on housewares than shoes, but it makes me feel really old.
Also, I just listed a bunch of new prints in my shop, including Aveline and some of my new silhouettes. Like these lil darlings:
Here are a couple more progress pictures of Aveline. (For my upcoming nautical themed solo show)
Just workin' away, she's so close!
skull progress.
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And on another note, thank you to everyone who participated in the giveaway! Our winner was a boy this time! :p
Also, T-shirts & iphone cases, skins, etc, are now available through my society6 shop. I'm tempted to order one myself!
And my new pirate silhouette is now in my shop, available for pre-order / made-to-order. These might not be up much longer as I spend a lot of time on each one and I have some big paintings to finish. So, get em while you still can ;)
Hello darlings. Did you have a delicious Thanksgiving? Good. Me too. In the spirit of sales and all those annoying things, I'm offering 10% off all orders through my Etsy shop until Monday. This includes all original silhouettes, original drawings & prints. (So stoked Etsy is finally allowing coupon codes, makes it easier for me to treat you all!)
Just enter the code:
ILOVEYOU
at checkout for your discount.
I'll also be hosting another giveaway on my fanpage soon. I do giveaways every 1,000 fans, so we're almost there.
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I haven't had a ton of time to be able to work on my painting as I've been cranking out these silhouettes for the past week or so. Which is fun, but I'm dying to finish this piece! So, here are a few more sneak peeks of miss Aveline. I started on her tattoos the other night, which is my favorite part. I am so loving octopus tattoos right now. They're more cartoon-y on my silhouettes and more realistic in this context.
I kind of like her in black & white. Sort of tempted to experiment with some black and white paintings at some point.
Anyway. She's coming along. Next I'll be tackling the compasses on her shoulders. I'm also really proud of her mermaid scales, which you'll see eventually.
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Got a few shows opening next week:
Dec 2nd - 111 at 111 Minna, San Francisco
111 artists! massive group show. fun times will be had. i'm super excited to be showing next to some reallllly stellar artists.
Dec 3rd - Snowflakes & Candycakes @ 323East, Royal Oak, MI
will not be attending this one. it's a little too far.. someday I'll make it out there!
Dec 4th - Mezzanine, San Francisco
an even BIGGER group show. 200+ artists, fashion designers, photographers, etc. party time.
The past few weeks have been really really busy for me, I'm sorry for neglecting you.
I did get to work on an illustration for Nylon Magazine which I had a lot of fun with.. Can't show it to you quite yet, but look for it in the "culture club" section of their Dec/Jan issue. Exciting!
Here are a few teaser images of the painting I've been working on between other projects.
Meet Aveline, sister of Ophelia.
I'll show you the whole thing when she's done. Doing something a bit different here, still painting on wood but am not leaving the wood texture exposed. I wanted something a little darker, something more intense. Oh, and be careful of her red eye.
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I got Ophelia and my feathered girl professionally photographed cause I didn't have time to fuss with it myself. The quality is ammazzzingggggg.
Lookit!
mmm crisp.
I will have updated prints of those two ladies in my shop this weekend. 10" x 10" and 12" x 12".
(I'll also be ordering some larger 20" x 20" size, let me know if you are interested. )
Hope you have a pretty weekend. My parents will be in town for a few days so I'm very happy about that :)
Ophelia. Name derived from Greek οφελος (ophelos) meaning "help". Her name also belongs to Hamlet's lover who eventually went insane and drowned herself. However, the similarities end there; this Ophelia will not meet the same fate as Hamlet's lover. The sea dare not drown her, she's one who would drown the sea. She posed for me once. Phantom trade winds made her hair dance gently around her eyes, caressing the sails on the boats that rest delicately on her shoulders. The air cooled as it passed over her skin, carrying aromas of salt sweetened by the sea flowers that grow in her wake. Perhaps she would suffocate without these ghostly sea winds, without the salty air to sustain her. Then there are her eyes. Those two left eyes. Oh, how they hardly blinked, how one remained locked upon my gaze. Her delicate tattoos serve as a futile warning, if you can read them, you are already too close. She grew impatient and I could feel the unease in her, how the earth felt unstable beneath her feet. Some would call her a prisoner to the sea, though a wiser man would know the sea as her prisoner.
As usual, I first primed the exposed wood with GAC 100, did about three coats this time. I prefer to paint directly on to the wood, as it makes blending colors easier, but having the outside portions primed makes it forgiving should any unwanted paint get on the wood (living with a kitten is sometimes dangerous). Detail was done in various colors of ink.
Tattoos drawn with black watercolor pencil.
Translated:
"Ad infinitum"(Latin)
"to infinity without end"
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"y de que nadie oyera las canciones de navegantes que a veces cantaba bajo las estrellas"
"and that no one should hear the songs that sailors sometimes sang beneath the stars"
From Gabriel García Márquez's short story Un Señor Muy Viejo Cona Alas Enormes (An Old Man With Enourmous Wings) (Thanks to my lovely Morgita for her vast knowledge of romantic poetry)
above is the framed drawing of the original "Boat Shoulders". The blueprints for this piece.
messy tubes of oil paint, little bottles of oil medium and a box of hooks, nails and screws.
Hope you like her, she'll be on exhibit in January for my solo show at Vessel. Prints coming soon.
Here she is, halfway there. I'm hoping to finish her this week. And fast, because she's getting impatient. She feels naked without her boats and tattoos. Is she staring at you too? Cause she won't stop staring at me.
It all started the other night when Joe and I were playing silly games on our iphones. One minute we were playing Trivial Pursuit and then I sort of saw this painting in my mind, the painted version of my drawing Boat Shoulders. I saw it much differently in my head than how it's turning out, but that's how it is. You see an image, then it flits away as quickly as it arrived. I'm left with a memory that I begin to form and shape in to a painting. I never really considered my drawings to be conceptual versions of paintings, but perhaps they are beginning to be. Anyway, I have this strange love for the nautical world and I think it is rapidly becoming a common theme / direction my work is taking.
Here she is at an earlier stage (Friday).
I seriously can't handle how beautiful this wood is. When the light hits it just right it seems to glow.
She's so tuff, even her tattoo has a tattoo. No, but seriously, she's just trying to figure you out.
And I'm just trying to figure out where I can get a bathing suit like hers.
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I'm going to be ordering some prints within the next few days. Any requests for prints that aren't currently in my shop? (You can see the full collection of my work on my website). I've sold out of Boat Shoulders, so I'll definitely be getting some more of those.
Let me know. ❤
I got my nose pierced at 454 on my 18th birthday several years ago, I was long overdue for some more!
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