Finding New Inspiration

I'm not competely sure how it happened, but somehow here I am, feeling like a real, productive artist for the first time in years. Mostly I have the art group I joined to thank for it, and somewhere along the way I discovered a process that I am completely infatuated with. For now. 

The theme for the week was "Doorways" and I "refined" my ideas in my head while walking around my neighborhood, as per usual. I've gotten out of the habit of the compulsive sketching I used to do, trying to work out each detail before I started anything. I finally realized that this process was self-defeating, because I was tired of my ideas before I got past the sketching phase. Simplifying not only the process but also my ideas made it much easier to be successful. 

I wanted the doorway to have dimension, be a black hole of sorts, so that left me with 2 options: carve out the wood, or build up the surface, then carve that out. I wasn't too confident in my wood-carving ability, and I had this rubber carving surface I wasn't using, so I decided to use that. It ended up being ideal; there's no backing on this stuff, so I could carve it right down to nothing, whichgave me the ability to give it some really nice dimension and provide a nce transition between the rubber and the wood painting surface.

The block below is the bottom piece of a three piece set. It represents an underground view, with the rubber illustrating the roots from the surface. I sketched it on the rubber, really basic, then carved it out so there would be a mostly smooth transition down to the wood. I fastened it down with glue and a couple of nails to be safe: 

Following my new rule of keeping things simple, and also because I wanted trees but was intimidated by the idea of drawing them, I decided to use leaves for the trees. No sketching needed. I pressed some leaves from the cigar tree out front, and then cut out the leafy parts so I was left with just the veins:

Using some gel medium (and a couple of nails in the thicker stems), I arranged the leaves in place to create the idea of roots (I used them in the other two pieces facing upward to represent the trees):

More gel medium, along with tissue (this stuff was wrapped around some jewelry I bought, that's why the color and design), layered over the rubber and leaves to add some texture and soften the edges. This was the last of the 3 blocks in ths piece that I made, and it took me this long to get the idea to shape the tissue to add even more texture, particularly along the bottom to add a little curve for the nest (later) to sit in:

After everything was dry, I gave it a coat of black paint, and then waited a week or so while I tried to get up the courage to start painting. I was so happy with the way the foundation of each piece came out, I was really afraid I would screw it up once I started painting.

And I actually did, the only one of the three that worked the first try was the top, simplest, smallest piece. The other two took at least 2 tries each, but in the end I am really happy with them.

To finish it up I added a coat of high-gloss varnish which really brought out the colors in the acrylic. All that's left now is framing it out.