A Romantic Corner

With the Sturbridge Show just a month away, I've been thinking a lot about how to display certain things. While picking up a few things we genuinely needed for the show, I saw a little cardboard box that was the perfect size for displaying a few small miniatures, and had to buy it as well. 

 

I used a sheet of wallpaper that I bought ages ago to paper the inside of the box. The paper is Society Garden from MiniGraphics.

I'd bought the paper because I thought the design was too pretty to pass up, but I never liked how bright the colors were. I gave the wallpaper a wash of coffee to tone it down. You can see wheat a difference it made! The floor is just a piece of full-scale wallpaper that was printed to look like chipping paint.

Once the box was papered, I had to play a bit. I pulled out a lot of different miniatures, but this was the combination that I liked best. The original post on the love letters can be found here. I thought I'd written about the watercolor and table (both of which I painted) but it doesn't seem so. 

This grouping was just for fun, since we're planning to fill the box with completely different items for the show. But I loved having the excuse to pull out old projects and try them in new combinations. I'll post more on the box itself another time!

A Cat Painting

 Yesterday the weather was so sunny and beautiful, it was the perfect day to dig out my watercolors, which I hadn't touched in far too long. In rearranging my bookshelves, I'd come across an old planner illustrated with antique watercolors. One of the paintings which caught my eye was of a sitting cat (you can see it here.)

 

 Here, I've lightly traced the frame I plan to use on the finished painting, and masked off space for the painting. I love the extra thin masking tape from model railroad shops because it has a very tight seal. I've never had a problem with it leaking. I sketched the cat and shadow freehand, adjusting a little as I went to compensate for my slightly wider frame.

My laptop is acting up, and won't let me upload the other photos, but here it is afterwards. The black frame just has an undercoat at the moment. I'll be drybrushing it to lighten it up.

Two New Watercolors

... or rather, one new watercolor, and an old one which I just got around to framing. 

 This city street is the newer painting. I tried something new for the frame, first painting it white and then brushing it with gold Rub'n'buff. Unless the frame is in sunlight, the metallic is very difficult to see. Otherwise, it really looks more like an aged, grey-brown finish. I liked the effect for this painting, but don't think I'll use this finish very often.

This portrait is one that I did about a year ago. Unfortunately, I used the wrong type of tape around the edges, and the background bled terribly. I stuck it in a box with a few other problematic paintings, and promptly forgot about it! When I I found it again, I really liked the dark frame, but the bleeding showed, and there was no space for a mat which might have covered it up. I had to use a bit of paint to salvage that white border, but I'm very happy with the way it finally turned out!

New painting

Just popping in for a moment to share this miniature watercolor. Framed, it's about an inch and a half tall.

Sorry to be so quick!

Another Painting

This was another watercolor attempt. I managed to get the scale right this time. I used a doll to double check the painting's head was a little smaller than life size.

Framing her was a little tricky. I usually keep the matting pretty neutral. Dark green or pale blue are generally my wildest choices. But this was a very warm painting, with lots of pink (it's a little washed out in the photo above). None of my regular choices worked. I tried the bubblegum-pink out of desperation, and was shocked that I liked it.

The frame color was a new shade of gold paint I was testing out. My favorite gold paint finally ran out a while ago, and when I replaced it, it seemed like they'd changed the formula to a much cooler (greenish yellow) gold.  This one wasn't bad, but it wasn't perfect either. It was a bit too warm/pinkish for most uses (though that worked for this painting!), and it needed quite a few coats. I'll let you know when I find my perfect gold again!

 One quick tip: If you plan to do a lot of framing, it's nice to save any matting mistakes (ones where I mismeasured, or the blade slipped, etc.) I use these mistakes to test mat colors before I spend a lot of time custom cutting one in the wrong color. Even a three mats in a dark, medium and light tone can sometimes help narrow things down!

Not Quite Right

When I haven't painted in miniature for a while, I struggle with the scale. I was quite pleased with this woman- until I held her up next to a few miniature pieces and realized she's about 3x larger than life. Of course, this occasionally happens in regular life too. My first "life size" full-body self portrait ended up over eight feet tall! But miniature paintings tend to look 'wrong' if they are significantly over sized.

 I decided to frame her anyway. She may end up somewhere in our 'real' house. I have a small collection of these larger-scaled but still tiny paintings, and I've been toying with the idea of grouping them on a small section of wall. I'll post another painting with better scale on Friday.

Watercolors

 Last night I dug out my watercolors for the first time in months. I love to paint in the summer- there's such great light! I realized when Mom and I were setting up for the show last weekend that the paintings were looking a little picked over. I didn't have many cottage paintings left, so I'm going to try to work on more over the next few weeks.

 I've only worked on this one so far. It still needs a lot of work. The frame is only laid on top as encouragement, and to check that the darkest colors are dark enough to show up.

While I had the camera out, I snapped a shot of this painting as well. I painted it for Mom a few months ago, but don't think I ever posted photos of it here. We both love Jane Austen, and while Persuasion is my favorite of her novels, we watch the 1995 addaptation of Pride and Prejudice quite often.



You can see that the paint bled horribly around the edges, which is why the painting is still unframed. I usually tape the edges of my watercolors to keep them neat. My favorite tape is extra-narrow masking tape from the model train shop which gives a nice clean line, but it's a bit difficult to find. I used a different brand of masking tape on this painting, thinking it would be the same, but as you can see it was terrible!