Some works in progress

Here are some of my recent works in progress. I’m horrible at remembering to take pictures of the whole process, so by the time I snapped these shots I had already done all of the steps listed below. I'll try to get better at taking actual WIP pictures in the future :)

First, I covered each small canvas in vintage books pages using acrylic matte medium to adhere and seal them. I just love the texture this adds to the piece.

Then, I used acrylic paint in various shades to paint the background. I like the paint to be just thick enough to see some of the text peeking through in certain areas, so I use a paper towel to wipe away some of the paint before it completely dries. I don’t know why, but I love shades of green, blue and purple and often struggle to even include other colors in my work. I am getting a little bit better and have done a few pieces with pink backgrounds…guess I’m just a “cool” sort of person :)

Next, I tore a page from a vintage ledger (blue piece) and an old book (green piece) into small pieces and glued the “clouds” in the sky. When they were dry, I added some charcoal to the edges of each cloud. The coolest thing about using gallery wrapped canvas is that you can carry over the collage onto all four sides…no framing necessary!

That’s as far as I got with the green piece. The next thing I did with the blue piece is tear another couple pages from old book to serve as the grassy area. I used pastels in shades of green to give the papers a green base, then added 3-4 shades of green and brown ink until it had the color and texture I was looking for.

I attached the “grass” using acrylic medium, then added charcoal to the edges of the “grass” to make it stand out a little more.

Coming Soon: the finished pieces.

~Alisa