The Grid Series

This is part of a new series I have been working with for about a year. I enjoy working on thick brown paper bags from the grocer's. So this one is about 8.5 inches wide by 29 inches high, crumpled and flattened back out, gessoed, then painted with acrylics. I have been focusing on crows lately because I love them and we have many to watch, photograph, and draw here. This crow is painted and cut out, then applied to the painted surface, as is the red branch (a scrap of fabric), the butterflies (black stencil on kimono silk laminated to origami paper that I had previously stamped and embossed), and the "eye thing" at the bottom. These elements were all glued on with something called acrylic wax varnish, and then more of the acrylic wax was put on top. The nice thing about the acrylic wax is that you can burnish it down to a lovely finish with steel wool- so it does resemble wax. Then on top of all that I beaded in a grid pattern. Then I added more beads in a non-grid pattern (see details) The grid pattern for the beads was interesting to work out. I basically pre-marked holes using graph paper and tracing paper, then pre-punched the holes with a T-pin so I would know exactly where they went. When sewing on paper it is always wise to poke the sewing holes ahead of time. The bottom "eye thing" is something I had drawn and scanned into Photoshop. I printed it on fabric and then on that lacy rice paper. I put the lacy paper on top of the printed fabric, stitched a bit, and scissor-edited a little of the lace before I glued it to the backing. It is inkjet ink but if you are careful painting it with glaze it does not bleed or smear much.

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