There's a New Canvas in My House!

You all know I LOVE canvas art! And so this weekend I decided to stretch my wings a little and try something different. I had wanted to do this all week, but I am trying to watch my pennies so I wouldn't allow myself to go purchase the couple of supplies I was out of. By Saturday I could no longer exercise any self-control and found myself in my car headed toward Micheal's! So after LOTS of hours in my studio, at the kitchen counter, and out on the back patio I am finally finished. I wouldn't say it is my favorite piece, but I do like it and the process was really fun.

So here it is . . .

I am calling it "There is No Greater Love"

 

I took pictures as I was working to show you the process in case you want to give it a try.

 So this is the beginning - I started off with an image of the Crucifixion  that I scanned out of a book. I laid it down with matte medium and then attached a double layer of cheesecloth to the entire canvas (I cut a hole in it for my image to show through) with matte medium as well. I made sure the cheesecloth covered the sides of the canvas as well and allowed it to be wrinkly. Then I just started crabbing things from my stash - embellishments, hardware, flowers, game pieces and so on. I experimented with the layout of these items until I was pleased.

 This is what my table looked like as I was working - and you should have seen the mess on my floor!

 

 I moved from my studio to the kitchen counter for this step so I could have more room and access to electricity for my hot glue gun. This is the final arrangement of all of my embellishments. They are all glued down and secure. I used a combination of hot glue, Glossy Accents, Ultimate and the dreaded E-6000 (that stuff makes me so sick - I try never to use it). The hot glue (another of my least favorite adhesives) was just used to hold things in place while the better adhesives had a chance to set. This keeps you moving and keeps you from having to hold on to things while they dry/set.

My Mother came in from church as I was working on this part - and gave me the "eyes" I assured it that I knew it was "ugly" but that it would get better.

 

These are some detail pictures to show you what all I used on my canvas

 Latches, laces, wings, cut nails, some sort of a gear I have had for years in my stash, keys, crowns and flowers

 Pen nibs, clock hands, bobbins, buttons, a domino, light bulb, clocks and gears and more flowers

 

 Ornate book plate, clock key, faucet handle, address number plate, key, charms and misc filigree pieces

 

This is the next step after you glue things down and let it dry real good.

I covered EVERYTHING (except my image and text) with a coat or two of gesso. It really starts to come alive at this point. You are no longer distracted by all of the different colors and textures. They all just seem to come together. It has a very "shabby chic" look at this point.

 This is just another view of above to show you all of the depth and texture created with all of these found objects.

My hands were a MESS in the following steps so I didn't take pictures for you. But here it is all finished

 Basically I just started with a thinned down layer of brown acrylic paint and washed it over the sides of the canvas and just partially over the top - kinda like a "frame" of paint. Next came the sprays - I am not a big "spray" person so my stash of those are very limited. But I used some Glimmer mist and some Dylusions sprays. I even made up some of my own with some acrylic inks I have and some reinkers. Cover your image and your text with some paper towels to keep the sprays off of them. Then just spray it until you like it (be sure to heat set between colors or you will get mud!) , wipe it dab it do what feels right while you are doing it. I even added a little bit of metallic rubs here and there. Lastly I hit some of the high points with a dry brush of white paint. I started from the left side of my canvas and moved right - this way the "light" that you are creating will all be coming from the same source. You could totally do top to bottom or right to left - just keep it going the same way.

Here are couple more detail pictures for you so you can see what changes were made to those embellishments.

 I just love all of the movement on this canvas. It is definitely a technique I will do again. But when I do I will be more careful when picking out my image. Although I love the image I picked, I wish I would have picked a brighter image so that it would have remained the focal point. Oh well, Live & Learn, right?

I hope you enjoyed seeing this and that you will give it a try also! If you have any questions that I didn't answer here feel free to email me or leave a comment.

Till we meet again. . . .