The wonderful ms. Tajah Gaines (what a great name, right?) presented me with the idea to be apart of "bringing back the art scene in Atlanta". What?? Are you kidding?? I'm in. I spend my days teaching art to 2-7 year olds (which is completely ammmmazing to be teaching art already). I'm definitely ready to get back in it. Too bad it takes an incentive to get me painting again. Whateeever though!
I have two 11x20 canvases that I got for christmas so, ok, I'll use those but other than that I have 1 large 36x48 canvas that I know I wouldn't have time to "cover" properly so it looks like I'll have to use some chip-board and an old canvas that I painted on years and years ago that I'm willing to work on. So, starting last Saturday night I whipped out everything and started prepping...
I didn't even know what I was gonna paint on this. I just knew I wasn't gonna hang that mess that was there b4...
I also have all this construction paper that's been painted on from my guys at school so I decided "what a cool way to make someone with crazy hair like mine!
I'd just rip it up and stick it on or something! So I thought that for my two 11x20s I would paint.... Lauryn Hill (cos I love her) and of course the woman with the most gorgeous hair alive... Erykah Badu. I see it...
The vision....
It's coming to me...
lol. Here's the sketch right onto canvas.
Ok... well if I'm doing 2 female vocal artists, then I guess I could go ahead and do two males?
...definitely Mos Def (bah da daaa. Da da da da daaaa. Bah da da da da da da da da da daaa.) Oh yeahh. And in my opinion (which is the only one that matters here anyway) you can't go wrong with
If all musical artists kept it real (simple) like these guys I probably wouldn't have deleted all the music from my ipod. (thats a whooole other story)
So here are my guys..
...It feels mad good to have it all planned out...
AGH! I wish I stopped myself more often to take progress pix. I just get so carried away with painting that when I do come up for air I'm like CRAP. I'm half-way done. Anyway... Here's where I ended up taking a pic...
After getting this far I decided to put her down for now and move onto the next piece...
This much took less than the length of a movie (I was watching alotta "movies-on-tv". You know the trash-type I'm talking about. It's the same ones over and over... uggggh
I moved onto Erykah next since I was in my naturally beautiful female groove... Yeah, that's what I'm gonna call it...
Ooo I'm so eager to start gluing the painted construction paper down... It'll be so fllyyy
But no.
Moving on.
I'm gonna get some man-action going on right now..
The canvas for Mos Def is actually really cool. Since It has an old acrylic painting underneath it's gonna have some texture (this is before I realized that paint could be flat. lol) Everything I painted in my amateur youth was all lumpy and abstract and had a name like "7 subtle faces". I mean that's definitely cool for the time. But we all (gratefully) grow up.
Still, the nice thing here is that I still have that texture on the canvas after gesso-ing. Gives Mos Def a uniqueness that I think suits him.
Why the ultra(marine) blue? *shrugs*
"Not really the best choice" I decided after the fact.
I'll just go back to what I have all visualized in my mind to do already. Erykah's hair. Hopefully that'll help...........
I love it but the passer-by-ers in this house are maaad critical. Tellin me they love the face but the hair is just.... not quite right. bah. ok. I'm switchin pieces again. I'm thinking Common must be feeling kinda neglected.... Let me show him some looove..
Me and the lack of progress pix.
Ah well....
A wash of colbalt blue and blue magnese (I know I spelled it wrong) and then I drew common on with watered down black paint and my paint brush.
Ok, I'm really slipin with my mans on the left. Maybe I'm working too big or something. Something's gotta happen.
As if I'm not far away enough from what "works" with him I added another "poppy" color. I felt so frustrated as to what I was doing wrong when (da da da daaaaaa) my buddy Alan gave me the wake up call to stop making Mos Def some contemporary artist. Having "contemporary" said out loud definitely made me see the errors of my way...
I just like taking pix of my workspace.
I know Common and Mos Def need something else. But what?
I've got this old music book...
But how to use it exactly...
(if it's not one thing it's always another. I just can't help but stress over ridiculous crap)
I followed the pattern on the right (more "city/skyline/urban" type?) painted the notes yellow (I liked the color) cut over a foot off the top of the board (it was really long. but was that a plus? Guess it doesn't matter now) and got:
Its sunday morning by now and I just want to be DONE. The show's Wednesday and I won't have time to paint during the week. All of my kids at school's work are preparing for the annual art show and I need to make sure no one gets left out, all work is matted, and everything is as finished as possible. It's ALOTTA work. Seriously. Trust me on that one.
I finished Lauryn the same way I did Erykah but I think I was a little hasty in choosing her glazing color. Now I'm thinking a turquoise woulda been a better match (I've used the color combo together a few times before and it's been pretty successful.)
But for now (and as far as Wednesday's concerned) I'm finished with her.
Last but not least....
Mos Def is killin me. In the end, I chose to use music again. I'm not real satisfied with the way it turned out on Common but maybe if I could cover up that bright green with music that would give him the more classic/original look I need to show with him.
Stay tuned to a blog coming soon that'll have better quality pix of the finished work!
Thanx!!
