Impressions

As a result of the mighty garage clearance last week I found I had a handful of older rather awful paintings that had been useful as a learning process at the time but that I really didn’t want to share with anyone and that I didn’t feel good about when I looked at, so I decided to recycle the boards with a different process.

I used a process that I’ve used before – something I picked up from an artist on youtube who very generously shared his work in detail. I would credit him here but it was some years ago and I can’t remember his name or channel at this stage.

The process involves a thin layer of gib stopping compound spread over a board – my paintings were on 18mm plywood. The image is then built up by pressing a variety of objects into the plaster, I use all manner of found objects, plant material, hardware, stamps, crochet doilies etc. Once dry the plaster is sealed with varnish and colours are added layer by layer with a coat of sealer varnish between each colour. At the end I used a dry brush technique to add a gold sheen and highlight over the textured surface.

Each stage in the process looks kind of lovely although it can also be a bit anxiety inducing as it changes with each layer and the end result is always a bit of a surprise. I will include images of each stage so that you can see the progression.

The result is really what I would consider to be decor art. They are really only decorative pieces but they look interesting and add great texture to the wall space.

The detail in the finished pieces is amazing you can even pick up the brush strokes from the undercoat paint on the base plaster. The plaster has cracked a bit on these ones because I made the layer of plaster a bit thick but I don’t mind that and I think it adds to the overall look of the pieces. Slightly distressed and aged.

Other than the plaster impressions I’ve been working on a vintage telephone table flip which I might include in another post. So many projects so little time.

Ka kite ano

Dawn aka Smokey Gnome