A.'s suggestion for proceeding with my water nymphs piece was to do a series of acrylic washes on the canvas rather than using a collaged paper background. I thought that sounded like fun so set to work tonight. Put the canvas on my new desk easel (I am such a sucker for new supplies!) and applied washes of Cobalt Blue/Titan Buff/Titanium White, Green Gold, Raw Sienna, and finally Quinacridone Red (all Golden Fluid Acrylics). I stayed with the same oval movement of the brush as I had with the original background of Cobalt Blue.
One of the most fun things is that once I was done with the wash, I applied the remainder to pages in my new moleskin journal (someone's suggestion for getting into art journaling--stamp ink of rubber stamps onto a journal page instead of scrap paper, dry brushes off on the pages, etc.--then you have a built-in background for journaling). They were ungessoed so will probably wrinkle, but you know what? I don't care! It was fun! I used different brushstrokes to apply the washes and enjoyed seeing how that came out. Since I am coming to this so late, I don't even know which brushstrokes I like, how they interact with each other . . . it's all so new and so thrilling to discover. Anyway, using up the leftover washes in my journal was at least as much fun as painting on the canvas itself.
I also used the leftover QuinaRed wash on a mini canvas that got assaulted during my time challenge piece and has lurked in my unfinished pile ever since. I'd tried inking it with Distress Ink first but that looked terrible (and I realize now I may not even have gessoed the canvas first), and I then ended up experimenting on it with Golden Crackle Paste. Then it was dimensional and kind of interesting in that respect, but it was also gray and thus ugly. I sprayed it with the LuminArte shimmering red spray, and that helped a little but not a lot. Painting over it with the red acrylic wash has helped to make it more interesting, and the shimmer from the LuminArte spray is still there, which is nice. I know it will go somewhere in the end; I just don't know where that is yet.
