A few years ago I’d sold a painting of fish on old slabs of timber to a friend. Fast forward a few years and someone who’d seen it wanted something similar.
Of course, its not so simple just ordering a painting on old timber, an old shutter or door. FIRST you have to FIND it. Which means looking at every rubbish pile you walk or drive by anywhere you go. Sorting through stacks of old wood wherever you see one, searching for something suitable.
Remember, I no longer have sheds where I can store every potential piece of rubbish wood I find…
Once you locate the right piece, you have to carry it home, then prepare it – wash and clean off dirt or whatever might have accumulated on it, sand off the worse weathering and layers of old paint, cut off any rotted or jagged bits it might have, mend where needed, and generally prepare the surface for painting.
Then paint it. Last finish with varnish and some method for hanging it.
Don’t get me wrong. This is right up my alley. I love doing this stuff. I just wish I had the luxury of the multiple sheds I had in Tasmania to store my stash of future projects. Back then I could pick up anything I thought would ‘come in handy one day’, so that when I had a commission (or an idea) I could just walk around the sheds looking for the right piece…
Those were the days…
Do you detect a note of nostalgia in my voice typing? Yes, you do. ‘Cause lately I’ve been thinking about Australia more and more and miss it more and more.
sigh.
Anyway. Enjoy some fish.
Here is the finished piece, sitting on my workbench outside cause I have no space to hang it.
This is the big fish I made for the exhibition last month. The gallery owner had asked me to make it and I thought it was a great idea. I love making things out of paper mache and any other materials I can get my hands on. And I love experimenting. And making something this size was a challenge.
I had made a life size bulldog a few years ago, but this is a totally different animal (haha). This is a link to the bulldog – unfortunately unfinished in this post…
Anyway, back to the fish. I’ll go through the process, which was all a bit hit and miss with a lot of learning in between. It took a while… not just the working but the drying…
I began with wire I’d gotten off old paper lanterns someone was throwing away. Recycling being the main aim.
I made the spine and ribs using the very hard wire, then wrapped it all in cardboard and masking tape. Lots and lots of masking tape.
I used cardboard to make the head and tail and moved on to paper mache using strips of newspaper, which is becoming a pretty scarce resource these days.
I had thought paper pulp would be the way to go so that the entire fish was recycled material, but the pulp was taking way too long to dry. And wouldn’t stick well either. Probably my own fault, I got the mix wrong… However, by the time I decided that it wasn’t going to work I’d already done the head and ribs on one side.
So I swapped to plaster. Using plaster bandages I coated the entire fish and that dried nice and fast and really hard, which was the most important part.
However the fish was getting really heavy and the spine was too flexible. Not good… I had to reinforce it somehow so that it would hold together well and not bend or crack.
I did what I always do: looked around me to see what I had that might work. I found an old piece of timber which was curved on one side. Perfect. I attached that to the fish going from the head all the way to the tail. I attached it using masking tape (the paper mache artists best friend!) and then plaster strips.
Of course I had to ‘blend’ the stick into the head and tail which I did using cardboard to create a curved look. And more tape and more plaster strips. It wasn’t totally realistic, but it did the trick.
In the end I wanted to give it a smooth finish (texture isn’t a good thing when something can collect dust) so I opted to finish the fish using air dry clay. I use air dry clay a lot to make small sculptures, and I knew i could make it work.
I love the way the fish turned out.
Would I do some things differently if I made one again? Yes, probably. I’d start with a stick for the spine and much harder material for the ribs… cut down bits of bamboo maybe, or dowel or whatever I can find. And attached using a drill and holes and glue… But not wire.
And yes, I will be making another. Soonish. It just takes time and I have so many other things I want to do, have to do, should do.
But I really enjoyed making it. Part of the work was done on my kitchen table when the weather was bad. Then when it got warmer I worked outdoors. The plaster work was all done outdoors. That stuff is MESSY.
Sorry about the pics that are vertical instead of landscape. Turns out WordPress won’t let me spin. I have to go back to the originals for that and I just want to get this posted. So there!
I made it while ago for a cousin who wanted it for one of her rental studios, but decided she didn’t want it. So I hung it over the couch in my living room. It was there for a couple of years. You can see how amazing it looked when the sun hit it here.
Well, the other day I decided I had to hang up all the artwork I’d brought back from the exhibition. I had made a series of paintings on a theme just for the exhibition, and they needed a home, so I took down the random bits and pieces I had hanging, filled holes and put up new nails (with new holes!) to hang my work. I’ll share the work and the new living room look soon.
Meanwhile, I’ve been doing various things around the house now that mom is back with me for the summer. I’ve had my brother staying while he was visiting as well so you can imagine it was pretty tight there for a while. I’d gotten rid of my queen sized bed this winter and was given a single bed for mom, but till she got here I’d been using my bedroom as a studio. Then, when Peter arrived, I had a blow up mattress in the bedroom for me while Peter slept in the living room where I normally sleep.
Anyway… when putting up the artwork in the living room I had to find a new home for the branch. Nowhere to put it in the house so I decided to put it outside. I removed the glass bottles cause, well, they’re glass and if they break it wouldn’t be nice… So I looked around for what I could hang off the branch to make it look interesting.
What I found were a whole lot of old brushes I’ve been holding onto to do something with. Ruined brushes. I have more to add, but here it is for now:
Its in a sort of indented space between two buttresses on the high stone wall in my back ‘yard’. Just wedged in there. I used to have bird cages with succulents in them but I’ve lent them to the art gallery where I had my exhibition for now. When I bring them back I’ll be putting them out the front of the house. Till then I have my brush branch and some plants below it.
Nothing too dramatic. Just kinda cute. Plus I now have somewhere to hang brushes to dry after use! And I’m happy I didn’t have to totally destroy it and throw it away.
I have always loved stitches where you don’t expect them – in wood, on paper, etc. When I found this bit of wood on the beach, with the big crack down the middle, I thought it would make a great project to ‘stitch up’.
After giving it a thorough clean, I drilled tiny holes for the wire as well as using some of the old nail holes to create the stitches. I added some raffia, a rusty heart and some dried lavender. It might not be a statement piece, but its sweet and I love it.
I love making something out of things I find on my walks and using bits and pieces I collect, finally giving them a purpose.
This was one of those quick and easy, ‘don’t think, just do’ projects I love cause they come out of the blue and are finished in no time at all, yet still give me that feeling of having achieved something special.
Another commission to share today, one which took me forever to do. I mean, I started them fine, back before summer… but then it was summer. Busy with grooming and mom being sick and visitors and all sorts of busy summer things.
Up to that point I had only done the structure of them, ie cardboard, masking tape and wire so I needed to move onto the clay or papier mâché part. Since the buyer didn’t want these finished in fabric, I decided to use air dry clay for the whole thing.
And I’m glad I did cause I love the way they turned out.
Given the brief for these guys was ‘something easy to dust’ I opted to spray them with white gloss paint, something I’d never done before as a finish for my work. But I’m really happy with the result.
Thought I’d share a quickie work I framed the other day. I say ‘quickie’ even though it was weeks in the making… mainly cause I had no idea what I was going to do.
Firstly, I glued an old, yellowed book page from a stack of throw away books I’d collected to a sheet of cartridge paper to create a background to work on like I did here, then I left it for ages, sitting on the kitchen table among the hundreds of things I was going to get to ‘soon’…
While working on one of my large paintings I decided to experiment with the texture building paste I’d bought, so I mixed up some paint and applied it to the paper, thinking I would do a small painting of a wall and stairs. I let it dry and as I looked at it, I felt totally uninspired to continue, so I let it sit and think about its sins a little longer.
Thing was, the more I looked at it. the more I liked the simplicity of the colours on the background and didn’t want to make it into anything other than a background.
Sometime during that period, I saw a FB post about a guy who created art by doing backgrounds then whacking paint covered sticks and branches onto his canvases. Hm… This was only small so I couldn’t go whacking the hell out of it… but I could try pressing something onto it… that might work.
And that’s what I did. Since it was a neutral background, I wanted to do something to bring it to life. I had some of those fuzzy dried flower arrangement things from other projects, so I chose my colours, et viola!
I used the same ‘flower’ to print the image in 3 different colours and I liked it. It’s like nothing I’ve ever done before, but I was pleased.
I had a small frame that fit the work, and I had flat white spray paint, so I sprayed the frame, gave it a bit of rub in spots where the paint hadn’t gone on well, and there it is.
At this point comes the warning/disclaimer. When doing spray painting at home, don’t pull the cap off the spray paint with a vice grip and the determination of a fat man going after the last chip at the family dinner table. I pulled it off (they do like to make them almost impossible to pull off!) and pulled off the spray nozzle at the same time. Putting the nozzle back on caused all kinds of grief as you can see.
But hey, it’s pretty normal for me to have paint all over my hands, my clothes, my shoes… no one expects anything less.
You might notice a bandage on one finger…? I got that while rummaging through a toolbox to find a screwdriver. Instead, I found a razor paint scraper (the kind you use on glass) without its protective cover.
This is one dog I especially loved doing. He belongs to a friend of mine and he’s a beautiful boy with a lovely personality and serious ball addiction.
He’s some kind of terrier mix with huge ears and a crazy coat.
Here is a close up of his face and those massive ears.
And a little 3D visual.
So, how did I achieve that coat you ask? Well, I thought the best thing for it would be to use gauze. I raided my medicine cabinet and took out some gauze which I dyed by soaking in coloured water: the black was diluted acrylic paint, and the tan was… you guesed it! Black tea!
I then cut up the gauze strips into sections and laid them over the figure in a way that matched Dizzy’s colouring and the direction of the coat.
I then brushed the gauze to loosen it up and give it a more ‘hairy’ appearance.
It worked out pretty well even if do say so myself.
Mind you, the coat is not soft and flowing. I had to fix him with PVA glue to make sure he stayed intact, but he’s a sculpture, not a toy, so I figure that doesn’t matter.
The friend that commissioned him asked about his eyes. I don’t do eyes on my dogs. I’m not really sure why, they just seem better that way. Maybe its because I don’t feel I can do them justice this way, not like I can in my paintings. Maybe its cause without eyes you can project your own eyes onto them, your mind automatically fills in the blanks and imparts the emotions that you want to see in the figures.
Maybe I’m full of crap. But I’m the artist, so I have creative license. Ha.
I had the idea to recycle these ‘things’ I didn’t want to throw away into something fun. I had this nice stick and some bottles left over from the larger wall hanging I made a couple of weeks ago so, while I was on a creative streak, I began working on this.
First I painted my ‘things’ white on the outside and a vibrant blue on the inside. Can you tell what they are? Go on. Its easy.
Then I edged them using a gold marker. Have you guessed?
Then I painted shapes inside them using a white paint marker. Have you got it yet?
I poked holes in the bottom, added a white pearl onto a piece of wire and attached them by wrapping the wire around the stick.
If you haven’t guessed yet, they’re cut up egg cartons!
I randomly wrapped the ‘flowers’ onto my stick, added bottles with sea glass, dried grasses and sticks in them, a couple of old chandelier crystals to refract light and almost done.
To finish, I wrapped the entire stick with hemp string to hide the wires.
I think it looks pretty flash and I’m really happy with it.
This is what the corner of my living room looks like right now. I’m constantly having to rearrange what I have on my walls. Not enough space for everything… Must sell some stuff to make room… Time to get back to listing stuff on Etsy and Ebay…
Did I mention my brother and his partner are visiting? They arrived today from Athens, they live in Canberra, Australia, so its been a long time getting here.
Anyway… while cleaning, tidying, organising and generally making space for visitors in my tiny home, I finished this project for one of my cousins. Its to hang over a bed in one of her studio apartments.
It was easy to make, I just had to find, scavenge, buy and put together the various elements, so it takes a little patience and imagination.
The branch I found while walking Vincent one morning. The little bottles I had to buy. Except one which I recycled. The wooden beads and raffia were from something I’d bought a while ago that I pulled apart. The string ‘vine’ I got online when thinking of making this. The hemp string I already had.
I always have different ropes and strings on hand.
Firstly I had to trim and clean the branch. And make sure there were no bugs on it or in it… Learned that the hard way…
I added some sea glass from my collection to a couple of the bottles (those with larger mouths), then randomly added a few dry bits and pieces collected on other walks.
I found some rusty wire in my collection and cut and twisted that to add a bit of whimsy. Plus I’m partial to rust…
I did have to buy some of those puffy grass things – no idea what they’re called, cause the ones I picked locally were pretty pathetic looking.
And a tiny bit of lavender and a small piece of driftwood, cause why not…
I especially love the way it looks when the sun begins to hit it in the afternoon.
I’m wondering whether I want to part with it now… I love it over my couch in the sun.
Miniature roses from one of my pots. They smell heavenly and I love the two different shades of pink of the two plants I bought. But there is some kind of disease affecting them. I’ve trimmed off the sickly leaves but don’t know what else to do… I’ve also moved the pots to the front of the house in case they like it better there, and I’m taking a twig to the nursery next week to see what they can recommend.
But back to the title… I got a cold last weekend, it started as a sore throat and I had two days where I couldn’t swallow. Then it went to my head, a drippy nose and sneezing all the time, with the added bonus of a dry cough. Eventually the drips turned into snot (lovely, I know, I love to share!), a blocked nose. I’m still headachy and have progressed to the joys of chesty coughs which come in bursts that hurt.
Oh happy happy days.
I’m told many people are sick on Paros with this cold/flu/not covid/virus thing. And I’m warned that it lingers. I’m not sure, but I did get some stuff from the chemist to ease the pain and lessen the cough… Let’s see how that goes.
My brother Peter and his girlfriend arrived in Athens yesterday (from Australia) and will be here next weekend and I don’t want this lingering then.
Meanwhile, since I was too sick to do much, I spent a lot of time watching makeover and declutter videos on YouTube.
I’m a regular declutterer with hoarding tendencies. I’m also an artist who likes to make things out of all kinds of other things, so I collect stuff to ‘make something with’.
Therefore, at least once a year I go through my cupboards, my craft and art supplies, my wardrobe and kitchen cupboards and get rid of anything that’s expired or I won’t use or wear.
But things are still too disorganised. Or maybe I should say that they become disorganised all too often, no matter how often I try to organise. Cause I’ve always got something ‘on the go’, or waiting for a spot to live, or to be moved on, or whatever.
Right now I can’t see my kitchen counter or the kitchen table yet, but I did go through and organise the bathroom and the living room bookcase.
So, since I’m more or less house bound while I get over this dastardly cold, and since I actually feel a little better today (when not racked with coughing fits) I decided to tackle the kitchen and get things organised in there…
And, like any creative with a shot of ADHD thrown in, I can’t clean, tidy and organise without leaving out ‘I will finish this’ or ‘I will get to this’ projects along the way, effectively never completely getting rid of the clutter.
However, I did a couple of tiny upcycles today to make my life FEEL a little more organised. Or at least ‘pretty’ organised. So here they are.
I was about to throw out these various plastic containers I had kept cause they’re handy for putting in leftover paint, bits of unfinished projects, etc. Instead I got out my trusty hot glue gun and some rope and started making them into better looking storage solutions.
This large ice cream tub was the first one I tackled, using thick cotton rope I had on hand.
I wrapped, glued, wrapped and glued my way around it till I looked like this:
The lid wasn’t my best work, in hindsight I should have treated this way differently, but it is what it is… The cost of this project came to about 4e plus quite a few glue sticks I had on hand, and the tub of ice cream which I had thoroughly enjoyed eating a while back.
This will now hold some of my bathroom accessories, things which aren’t used to often, but can now be hidden away.
Next I tackled one of the yogurt containers. This is a different rope and it turned out way nicer. I especially love the little loop on top.
This is now holding my phone chargers and Australian plug adaptors which always sit on my kitchen counter and add to the mess.
I actually love this one so much I’m buying more of that rope to do another similar container…
I used up the rest of the rope on two smaller containers: this small container to hold my rubber bands. Nicer than having them in a glass jar I think.
I did these small projects with minimal damage to myself thanks to these handy little hot glue gun finger sleeves I got from Temu. SO handy. If, like me, you only have the scalding hot hot HOT type of glue gun, you need these. Next time I buy a glue gun I’m going with the less dangerous, low heat type. Although now I have these, its no longer a matter of life or death.
Of course, all this was overseen by Vincent who kept one eye on me the whole time.
I’m off to continue on the tidying and organising and working on some of the ‘I’ll get to this’ projects.
I really hope this is the beginning of a creative period. I need one to feel better about myself.
junk4joy 