A Painting Update

 Since I last posted about painting, it has really taken over my life! I share all my work on my facebook page, and have many pieces for sale and am available for commissions. I don't have a shop currently but I plan to soon!

This triptych is 'Yveltal', three 8x8 inch canvasses. £50 for the trio, plus postage.

I painted 'Islands' when I was missing the sunshine. It is 30cm x 40cm. It is available for £45 plus P&P.

This is 'Phoenix Rising' and it is on a 20x30cm canvas. It is hard to catch on camera, but the background is actually a really deep blue that I love using. It is for sale for £30 plus P&P.

'Sunset over the Galaxy', a 30cm round canvas of purples, with hints of white, pink and orange. For sale, £45 plus P&P.

This was so fun to make and it I just love the colour tones.

'The Forest Breathes', a 30cm round canvas of different shades of green, blue, aqua and gold. £45 plus P&P.

This has the same colours in it as 'The Forest Waves' (below), buy them both together for a discounted price of £70.

'The Forest Waves', a 20cm x 30cm canvas. For sale for £30 plus P&P.

And below are two pieces that already have their new homes. The black and white painting is up in Labyrinth in Grimsby, so if you get pierced, check it out!

This piece is in the amazing artist Betty B's home, which fills me with joy!

I'm having so much fun creating, and I love them!

Kitty

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Kitty Paints A Lot

 A couple of months ago I shared my first attempts at painting, and since then I've not stopped! I actually have now set up a Facebook page just for it, and sticking with the naming theme, it is Kitty Paints A Lot. I figured I'd share some of my more recent paintings!

This is called a 'kiss pour', made mostly using Dyno paint by Pebeo which are some favourites of mine because of the lovely iridescent sheen they have.

This is part of my 'Alien Rainbow' series that my husband kindly finished for me with a gloss varnish to make the black really pop.

Another from my 'Alien Rainbow' series, using the same colours as the one above, but in a different technique.

In fact give a take a colour, all three of these paintings have used the same colours, just in totally different styles. I'll share more paintings soon, but in the mean time, follow my Facebook page for more regular updates.

https://www.facebook.com/kittypaintsalot

I am available for commission, so drop me a message if you want more info.

Much love,

Kitty xxxx

Paint Pouring : My Second Swipe

 In my last blog I talked about making two paintings as a surprise for my Grandad, I shared one, but not the matching one. The first one I shared here, was done with exactly the same colours as this one, but with white, and this was done with black. My aim was to create a sort of Spring/Autumn diptych, inspired by my Grandma's favourite clothing items. This is Autumn.

        

These are both wet, you can see the changes as it develops. The drying really allows the gold to come through, and the colours to show properly with these sort of methods.

This is the final finished piece. I used iridescent paints from Pebeo mixed with water, Pebeo pouring medium and silicone oil for these. Once dry, that sheen from the iridescent paints really comes through beautifully!

        

Some close ups that really show off the colours and details better.

        

I'm loving my new hobby!

Much love,

Kitty

xxxx

Paint Pouring : My First Swipe

 I recently blogged about my new lockdown hobby, acrylic paint pouring, and since then I've been really obsessed with practicing and improving. I bought some new supplies, Pebeo paint as it comes highly recommended and has been on sale at Hobbycraft, Pebeo pouring medium, which is mixed with the paint for a smoother flow, and silicone oil. You use silicone oil to make what are referred to as 'cells', they allow paint of different densities to rise to the surface of the painting.

I decided to do two paintings inspired by my Grandma. She always wore a pink flowery scarf, and in the summer loved a cream silk shirt. I picked colours that made me think of her and decided to do a style called a 'swipe', with silicone oil to make cells. When using silicone oil, a blowtorch is handy, yes really! It helps pop air bubbles within your paint, and also activate your cells. As the painting dries, the cells will change and grow, so a wet painting will look quite different to a dry one. I also used iridescent paint, which isn't obvious when wet.

             

The left photo is it straight after pouring, the right a couple of hours after. You can see the cells become more prominent and more colour has come through. It takes a long time for this sort of painting to dry, so once it was finally dry, this is what it looked like.

The photos really don't show the iridescence well, but I also took some close ups of the details. Once dry the gold comes through a lot more, as well as the shine of the paint.

             

            

I'll post part 2 of this series with the matching piece soon!

Much love,

Kitty 

xxxx

My New Hobby : Acrylic Paint Pouring

 With lockdown and the pandemic not ending any time soon, I decided I needed a new hobby. I'd always wanted to get into painting, but wasn't quite sure how I wanted to do it. I knew it would be abstract, realism wasn't something I was going to be able to do, so I started exploring online and discovered paint pouring.

First thing I needed was some paint. My bestie Fal is an artist and she recommend The Works for cheap but decent acrylic paint. I ordered myself some of these Crawford & Black tubes, £2 for 200ml, in a variety of basic colours.

Next up is the prep. You need something to paint on. Most people paint on canvas, but I've been using wood. My husband has gotten into wood work so I've been pinching his offcuts to recycle for my art projects. I make sure the wood is smooth, give it a wipe with a damp cloth to make sure it isn't dusty, and then paint a base layer onto the wood. I'd recommend painting a base layer on any canvas if you are using that too. I let this dry for a day before I then began the pour itself.

The most important part of paint pouring is your mix. For acrylic paint you can get proper liquid for pouring, but for a budget option you can also use water, which is what I used. It needs to be a 50/50 mix of paint and water that flows nicely, but isn't watery. It's easiest to use clear plastic cups for this so you can see the mixture, and something like a lolipop stick to mix it. I used wooden BBQ kebab sticks to mix as this was what I happened to find in my kitchen drawer that I could use without buying anything else. You want it to be able to drip off the stick, but not run. You can also add a couple of drops of silicone oil which when combined with heat creates 'cells' in paint, but again, I haven't purchased any yet to try that out.

I laid out a plastic sheet on my kitchen table, and had three pieces of wood prepped to use. On YouTube a lot of the people who do paint pour videos have a lot of waste that drips off their canvas onto their work area, and I wasn't keen on that, so I decided I would put a smaller piece of wood in front of me to let the excess paint drip off onto, rather than waste it.

For my first attempt, I didn't want to use too many colours in case it went wrong. I picked out white, blue and green, atlas sort of colours, and figured I'd create some sort of surreal earth looking painting.

I started out pouring white paint onto the centre of the wood, creating a sort of pool. Then I poured blue directly onto the white, and then green directly on top of that too. Then it's time to pick up the wood and start tilting it to get the paint moving. I realised quite quickly that you need a lot more paint that you first anticipate in order for it to cover your base, so I added smaller pools of the three colours further towards the edges of the wood to make sure it would totally cover. As the paint ran off this wood I made sure to drip it onto the smaller piece of wood so I didn't waste the excess.

I also had a second piece of wood prepped as I thought I might have enough paint mixed to do that one too and I was right, and some! For these three I mixed approximately 50ml of paint with 50ml of water, and had some leftover of all three paints.

Once I was happy with how the painted had tilted and spread out across my first piece, I had a small bit of wood ready to pop it into so that it stayed raised off the plastic sheeting and didn't stick to it.

This is piece number one! I was so thrilled with how it came out. The wood I used wasn't totally flat and had some holes and marks in it, but this was just my first attempt so I don't mind.

This is the smaller piece of wood that I dripped the excess onto so I didn't waste it.

This is the other larger piece I did at the same time. If you find there are gaps that won't fill it's very easy to just pour a tiny amount more paint onto the base that you think will work. I usually try to add a couple of drops of more than one colour so it mixes in better rather than being an obvious blob of paint.

These don't have any sealant on them, so they will need varnishing or covering to protect the acrylic. Because of the thickness of the paint, these do take a lot of time to dry, it was a good three days before I could move these and then use my workspace again, so be sure you aren't occupying a space you need to  use anytime soon.

On the third day I decided to prep another 2 pieces of wood for another attempt. This time I utilised part of an old bit of wooden furniture. As all the edges were solid, I made sure to paint all four edges of the wood as then if I wanted to put it up on a wall without a frame I could. As the paint drips off the edges, they can easily become part of the art itself.

This time I wanted to go for some really contrasting colours. I had plenty of white mixed up from my first attempt that was still fine for me to use, the blue and green were also fine to use but I wanted to use different colours. Inspired by an old favourite pair of Converses with flames on, I mixed up some black, red and yellow to go with the white.

This time I made a lot of different smaller pools of paint in random mixtures across the whole piece of wood to get more movement. This was a much bigger piece of wood so I wanted to make sure I had plenty of paint ready.

I also had the piece of wood ready to catch the drips so as not to waste them, which is the piece below. The many small drips mean a lot more detail and smaller mixes of paint, so you can decide which look you prefer.

The other thing I will mention is that your hands will get covered in paint as you pour, so make sure you aren't wearing anything you don't want to get paint on, and that you have decent soap and an open door to where your sink is so you don't risk transferring paint onto doors when you are ready to wash up! I've not worn gloves to pour as acrylic paint is very easy to wash off, and disposable plastic gloves every time is just creating more plastic waste.

There are a lot of other ways to do paint pouring, including pouring all your different paints in one cup and pouring directly from that, using a hairdryer, and all sorts! I can't wait to experiment with more, and will probably invest in some canvasses in the new year to try out some larger scale pours.

Have you taken up a new hobby, or rediscovered an old one in 2020?

Much love,

Kitty xxxx