Whimsy Bear

Hi everyone, 

Welcome to my very first blog post on 'A Drop of Whimsy'.  I hope you will join me on my journey into mixed media and life, with all the challenges that they both bring.  I am feeling equally excited and nervous about taking this step outside my comfort zone, but I've got my big girl pants own so I'll be okay.  

If you have any questions or comments about art or life, please add below and I shall do my best to answer.

I started by drawing this little guy out using my PITT Charcoal Pencil.

I had great fun painting the background with my Americana Acrylics, but then I usually do.  When I first started painting back in March this year I was really not comfortable painting backgrounds, in fact it's safe to say I hated that part of the painting process.  I use to worry about what colour combination to use, what paint effects to try and most of all I worried about getting it wrong.  It got to the point that I would either sit staring at my paper in a state on anxiety, walk away or just avoid my desk altogether.  The only cure for me was to just push through that anxiety and paint, paint, paint.  I painted lots of  mud, but managed to produce just enough okay pieces that I didn't lose complete interest.

I can honestly say I love painting backgrounds now.  I love playing and experimenting with colours, textures and patterns, it's amazing the difference practice makes.  Now I know if I don't like something I can just paint over it, but there are still sometimes when I still get anxious over a painting and have to walk away from them.  But me and my art are still a work in progress.

I gesso'd over the background with my brayer to mute the colours down and I then finger painted my bear with more gesso and acrylics.  This is what I call the butt ugly or teenage stage and is probably the stage I am most likely to walk away from when things are really not going well.  But with this little guy I was so busy sqawking along with One Republic that I didn't really pause.  I apologies to my neighbours if they are reading this, I'm sure they will agree that although I lack skill in the singing department, I sure make up for it with enthusiasm.

I then added some rosie cheeks, charcoaled in his eyes and outline before using my white sharpie marker pen to add a little glint to his eyes.  For the last touch I re-added some yellow with my finger before charcoaling the flower outlines to finish.

I'm really pleased with how he turned out, love his expression.

Love
Julie