Bright and bold - Andy Skinner challenge

Bonjour à toutes, Hello everyone! 

Je vous montre ma participation au challenge d'Andy Skinner, sur le thème BOLD & BRIGHT. Un challenge où il faut introduire des couleurs, de la brillance, et réaliser une oeuvre Mixed Média en jouant avec les produits DecoArt et ceux conçus par cet artiste designer lui-même. 
Je tenais vraiment à participer à ce challenge, ne serait-ce que pour le remercier encore de l'oeuvre que j'ai reçu de sa part gagnée il y a déjà quelque temps à la suite d'un blog hop Stampendous - DecoArt, elle est toujours en bonne place dans l'espace où je crée !

J'ai réalisé pour l'occasion un canvas qui mesure 18 x 24 cm, et qui fait 4 cm d'épaisseur. ça m'a permis d'y introduire un texte sur la tranche, car après hésitation j'ai préféré ne pas mettre de titre sur le devant, pour une libre interprétation.

Today, I am sharing with you my entry to Andy Skinner Challenge, on the theme BOLD & BRIGHT. This is Andy's first challenge, and I'm very happy to join in! Even if I don't win it as there will be probably many fabulous entries... :) But it's my way to thank him again for the fabulous piece of art I won - offered by himself - after a great blog hop organized by Stampendous - DecoArt. I had been so lucky, a double winner!! Really spoiled... I continue to cherish Andy's art piece, still and exposed in my craft space.  

I had fun creating this canvas using my DecoArt great stuff and paints received after my win, but also some others bought afterwards and some of the stencils and stamps I have in my stash designed by Andy Skinner. I love this artist and his wonderful art and genious techniques, and this is my offering in honour to his wonderful talent. 

I created my piece on a 18 x 24 cm canvas. This canvas is a deep edged one with 4 cm on each side. It gives the opportunity to take your design around the sides and on top. It helped me put a quote on Nature onto the right edge only... I hesitated for a while before that step, but finally decided not to integrate any text on the front board to be left to interpretation.

Pour mon inspiration, j'ai un peu pensé à l'arbre d'or, que vous pouvez voir en forêt de Brocéliande... mais finalement ce n'est pas le titre que je donnerais à ce tableau si je devais lui en donner un, car j'ai choisi de mettre plutôt ce petit couple d'enfants en doré!

For my inspiration regarding the scene, I was first thinking to a famous place in Brittany so-called L'Arbre d'Or (litteraly, The Golden Tree)... But finally, instead of the tree I covered with gold only the couple of little children... :)

Je vous traduis la citation que vous apercevez sur la tranche, je la trouve très belle:
"La nature ne se hâte pas... mais tout est accompli".
Encore qu'en ce moment hélas, elle se hâte un peu trop du fait des changements climatiques, ce qui a des effets dramatiques..

The quote on the edge is "Nature does not hurry... yet everything is accomplished". LOVE this sentiment, though at the moment we observe some dramatic changes in the climate that also change the behaviour of Nature..  

 

 

Celles qui me suivent savent que j'aime bien fignoler les détails... Du coup, après avoir fait toute une série de photos, j'ai décidé de rajouter le petit oiseau en bas de la scène 
(Visible sur la photo suivante)

You may know that I love working on details...
So after taking all the photos... I finally decided that I wanted a little bird at bottom left of the scene 
(you can see it on the photograph below)

Pour mon tableau, j'ai suivi les contraintes du challenge et utilisé mes peintures acrylique fluides DecoArt, de la pâte à modeler noire DecoArt, un des pochoirs ANDY SKINNER que vous pouvez aussi retrouver (pour celui-ci du moins) chez Tando Creative, et une de ses anciennes planches de tampons Clear que j'aime beaucoup. 

J'ai fait quelques photos aux premiers stades que je vous montre, par contre les détails techniques sont en anglais. Si vous avez des questions n'hésitez pas!

There is no end to the color schemes and wonderful shades that can be got by using the Media Fluid Acrylic line of paints, they blend together very nicely. I used just a few different colors of Fluid Acrylic paints and Media misters to make the background for this, a bit of black DecoArt modeling paste, ANDY SKINNER stencils (finally only 'Children' here, released by Tando Creative), one Clear stamps set designed by Andy too in the past ('Back to Nature') and some other stuff to complete. Here is a brief tutorial of the first steps mainly.

   

I first gathered some materials from DecoArt and Andy Skinner, you can see which ones I thought I could use primarily on the photo above. (thinking at first to a great stencil I have but never used yet: the Reaper... But finally changed my mind haha, this will be for another time).

I played with white Gesso and catalyst brushes... A heat gun at this stage for drying is ace. Go in close to create those wonderful Gesso bubbles – I love them!!!

Then I used a combination of yellow, orange, red, green and purple paints brushed or misted onto the surface. To give a punch of color I added deep purple and green paint misted at the background. Adding a bit of grey too.

Then when dry I brushed a coat of blue... I wanted to have a try on getting some beautiful peeled splatters of paints like Andy, by following as much as I can his fantastic Splash technique you can watch in this You Tube Video (at least I tried, but I took the wrong product I think - satin glaze instead of drying time extender maybe) so over the top I poured a few drops of satin varnish, waited a bit, then wiped off some blue colour... but the result was not the one expected, sadly :-) 

Not too bad result though, happily! it allowed me to introduce in my background one more layer of paint, with luminous, beautiful trailing lights back into the sky.. (Edit on 9th March: I made another attempt today with drying time extender on a prepared masterboard, and this time it works well!! Not so well and beautifully than on Andy's work, but I was pleased with it, its a good start; Will repeat the process and show here the results later :D). 

I chose to work with the Children stencil (only this one finally... as sometimes, the less is the more) and taped it to the bottom of the scene I wanted to create. I applied Black Modeling paste with a palette knife over it first.. Then gave a coat of Titanium white, and next DecoArt Chalky Finish Crackle medium. This was another experience for me, I wanted to try to get a bit some of the fabulous effects Andy created on his amazing pear although I didn't have white crackle paste... I had been so much impressed by this masterpiece, wow!!!!

Once the crackle medium had dried it was given a coat of Flitter glue and left to dry. Mega flakes were then applied over the children... I tried to cover them with a bit of Decoart Traditions Transparent Yellow Iron Oxide and Quinacridone Gold... Unfortunately, the flakes did not sink nicely into the cracks which is what I was hoping for. 

The rest is work and love... to ink and stamp the wonderful tree and other beautiful stamps by Andy Skinner from his plate 'Back to Nature', add more pops of color and shading here and there, and played to build the scene slowly... 

Here is the list of supplies used:

DecoArt Products: 

Black Modeling Paste
Media Fluid Acrylics paints:  Vermilion, Naphtol Red Light, Primary Yellow, Titanium White, Cobalt Teal Hue, Dark Grey Value 3, Carbon Black, Metallic Gold
DecoArt Media misters: Purple, Yellow Green
DecoArt Tradition Faux Finishing medium 
Decoart Traditions Transparent Yellow Iron Oxide, Quinacridone Gold
DecoArt medium Glanz-Lack
DecoArt Chalky Finish Crackle medium 

Stencils: 

Andy Skinner's 'Children' (Tando Creative)

Stamps: 

Andy Skinner's 'Back to Nature' (Personal Impressions)

Miscellaneous:  

Princeton brushes

White Gesso
masking tape, Indigoblu FlitterGlu and Mega-flakes Yorkshire Dales, 
Stazon inks (Jet Black, Eden Green, Olive Green, Dove Grey)
White Sharpie pen, ..

I had an absolute blast with this project. 

Thanks again Andy Skinner for the opportunity to do it! With a chance to win a fabulous prize and giveaway offered by DecoArt moreover. You still have time to submit, click on Andy Skinner's name for the details.  

Thought I could also enter this into the following challenges:

- Anything but Cute as their current challenge #11 is Crazy for Colours!

- Craft Stamper Take It Make It March challenge: Anything Goes

Voilà, désolée pour ce post un peu long et en anglais seul pour certaines parties. J'espère que vous ne m'en tiendrez pas rigueur, ça me permet de libérer un peu de temps sur mon agenda chargé. En tout cas j'espère que mon tableau vous plaît, moi je l'adore... Merci aussi de tous vos commentaires précédents, et sur ce tableau aussi peut-être. Bises et bonne journée !!! 

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your comments mean a lot to me, makes me feel like I'm not alone. Hugs xx

~Coco~

Comments

[butterfly]

Truly superb - amazing work with the DecoArt products to create something so dramatic and atmospheric - it really is magical, Coco!

Alison x

[scrapandlys]

Ma Coco... c'est merveilleusement beau... je ne sais plus quoi dire ! j'adore... oui ! tu connais mon penchant pour cette langue de l'autre coté de la manche !!! mais même si je n'ai que regarder les photos je suis sous le charme. Bisous

[Nefertiti]

Un petit trésor ce tableau. J'aime le choix des couleurs. Bravo ma Coco. Gros bisous

[carolec]

sublime!! bisous

[Sandra]

Wahou, quel superbe fond. L'ensemble rend magnifiquement, et j'adore ton idée d'avoir débordé sur les tranches de ton canvas. Ca doit être drôlement joli, en "vrai" !

Bisous ma Corinnette :)