A Custom Frame

Whenever I can, I like to avoid actual frames and make the painting frame itself.  Here I'm creating a "custon frame" on a piece of 1/4" thick hardboard.  I began by spraying the entire board with white primer from the hardware store.

Next I applied my first layer of collage.  I want this frame to be neutral in color, so I chose several papers from my stash that are neutral - including the very light green from an old Sunset Western Garden book because I  know the central subject will be a landscape, and green will go with that.

Before, I have always avoided the straight edges of my papers, but this time I used them along the edges and in the corners of the board.  I'm tearing my papers, and laying them down in fairly large chunks.  I just pick somewhere to begin and go from there, using Liquitex Mat gel medium as my adhesive.  I also put the medium over the paper.  My only guideline in this layer is that I generally want the bottom part to be darker than the top.

Then I used a ruler to make a light pencil mark 5" in from all the edges and applied a layer of white gesso within the center area, but being a bit fuzzy on the edges.

Then I put a wash of white gesso over the collage, thinner in some places, and thicker in others.  I also added another layer of gesso in the center part.

Now on to the next layer of collage.  I'm using smaller pieces here.  I want lots of richness in the texture.

Next, another wash of gesso, and a third layer of gesso in the center.

Now to tone the whole frame area with a wash of Raw Sienna.  I'm using Golden fluid acrylics.  I darkened a few places with a bit of Light Burnt Umber wash.

For the final step, I added a third layer of collage using tissue paper that I had stenciled with a leaf design using the white gesso.  I made the stencils from my own drawings using my Cricut machine.

Here's a detail.  You can see that in a very few places in the bottom part of the frame, I left a few small areas uncovered with the tissue - the darker pieces, like the dart shape coming in from the left at the bottom of the photo.

Now on to the main painting - hope I don't ruin this frame!

Finished with Twigs!

This is the finished piece.  The final step was to add the twigs at the top.  I've had these branches inside for several months, so I know they're really dry and won't shrink.  When I first held them in place, I didn't like them.  They were too dark.  So I got our my craft knife and whittled the bark off.  When I was done, the twigs were nicely mottled and matched the colors in the rabbits.

I didn't glue them in place.  Instead, I drilled pairs of little holes into the board and attached the twigs with small pieces of copper wire around the branch, threaded through the holes, and then twisted in back.

Almost Finished

The only part of the piece that I continued to work with was the lower left corner where I added more washes.  I also added the text around the outside edge of the curve as the top.

Then I added the gold rim by first applying an edge of Golden Coarse Molding paste, using my finger to apply it.  It took overnight to dry.  Then I painted Jaquard Lumiere Bright Gold over the molding paste, covering it carefully with a brush.

Just one more step...

Correction Needed!

If you look at the bottom of the painting in the last post you will see that the lower rabbit is cut off mid way down the body.  That's because when I did the original drawing I intended that that would be the bottom of the piece, but when I arranged things on the board I didn't like the rabbits being quite so low down, so I glued them on with a gap of about 3" at the bottom.  Now I have to do something with that gap.

I had three thoughts - I could put a band of something across the bottom, or I could finish the bottom of the rabbit, or I could put something in front of him.  I decided to finish the bottom of the rabbit.  I thought I was done!  But I put it up beside the TV to study it and immediately decided that the lower left was just too empty.

More rabbits!  I thought I'd need two more.  But I began with just this one with her back to use and looking back over her shoulder.  Once I put her in place, I was happy with the composition.  So now on to finish the piece.

By the way, this photo shows the difference between the drawing to the graphite and colored pencil stage (lower left rabbit) and the drawings with light washes of acrylic over them (all the other rabbits).

Begining the Collage

The photo quality is pretty bad, but hopefully you get the idea.  I painted the background - antique white at the bottom a few light blues and light blue-greens in the middle, and soft white at the top.  I used opaque acrylics and roughly blended the colors together.

After that I began the collage.  For the collage papers, I made several sheets of tissue paper.  I used stencils that I made with my Cricut machine and designs of blossoming almond branches and falling petals.  I stenciled the white tissue paper with gesso, then painted over it with watercolor.  The watercolor doesn't stick very well to the gesso, so the stenciled parts remain light.  For some of the pieces with falling petals, I mixed a bit of red into the gesso then used blue watercolor over it.  I really enjoyed this part!  By the way, I used Liquitex mat gel medium to adhere the tissue paper.

For the petals around and below the rabbits, I cut shapes from scraps of this tissue paper and glued them on with mat gel medium.

I've also cut pieces of 1/4" thick hardboard to back the upper rabbits and adhered the drawings to them.  The corner pieces are just taped in place for the photo.

Fallen Petals - the Layout

I also wanted two rabbits for the top of the piece.  Once I had those drawn, I could decide how big the overall piece would be and construct the cradled board.  The large piece is 1/4" thick hardboard and the edges are 3/4" pine.  These boards are pretty easy to construct and, for large boards like this one, well worth making as they are expensive to buy.

I sprayed the board with primer, then applied the main group of rabbits with Liquitex matte gel medium.  The top rabbits are just taped on for the photo.  Later I'll cut corner pieces from more 1/4" thick hardboard and attach them to those corners.  But I want to finish the background - at least at the upper part of the piece - before I add the corner pieces.

A New Technique for the New Year

I'm starting a new piece.  I'm inspired by a memory from several years ago when I was visiting my parents in Arizona.  They had a small cluster of almond trees in their back yard.  The trees were full of blooms - the air was full of falling petals, and the ground was pink with almond petal "snow."  A group of cottontails were feasting on the petals.

So this will be another piece in which I will experiment with using drawing in a collage.

Here's the drawing of the rabbits.  I used HB, 2B, and 4B mechanical pencil.  then lightly added bits of color with Derwent Drawing Pencils.  I have a nice set of 24 pencils in natural, muted colors.