Anatomy of a Painting - Tie Dye Garden

I wanted to do something bright, something floral and still abstract. I work alot with blues, and for once wanted to have a painting with no blue in it. 

I laid out the canvas for a tryptic style layout. I used ALOT of paint because I knew I was going to loose a lot of it in the process. Now think of a bug crawling thru a flower garden in full bloom. As you look around, what would all that glorious color look like? That is where we start.

We are a bug in a garden and have an up close and personal view of a bloom, now lets move forward shall we?

Water - tons of water, this is where I am loosing paint. I spray, spray, spray the canvas and then tilt it around slightly for all the colors to run. This gives is a tie dye effect - cause you know I can't leave the house without at least one piece of tie dye on :)

This is going to take a while to dry, so I am really looking into this piece, taking the vision further. It needs depth, it needs some shadows, it needs a darker color. 

Lets go for the blue :)

There is still a lot of water on the canvas, so the blue/green begins to 'melt' into the pattern, PERFECT! I don't tilt it around, I just let it do it's thing. 

As it dries, you can see how the blue started to crawl thru the painting, making it seem alive. 

Now that the painting is fully dry, there is still some need for depth, for definition. On the parts of the canvas that had little to no paint, I used a black color pencil to shade in areas.  That helps to bring the color forward. Then to help define the 'petals' of the flower, I used a sharpie and made random lines, tracing the 'petals'

Now you can see them side by side, finished, as I had envisioned them!

Items used, acrylic paint, color pencils, sharpies.

And as always, Be peaceful, Be kind. 

Remember to explore, create, dream, imagine and discover!