Sunday, January 30, 2011

how i spent friday

1} i painted a canvas. 
note: i don't have painting skills, so i just sat there for a little while, then tentatively dabbed paint in some places. even though i was wearing a frilly shirt and listening to pedro the lion and just felt very artistic overall that day, i could not for the life of me successfully transfer my mental images to the canvas on the table. i eventually made myself so disgusted and angry that i grabbed a paper towel and scrubbed at the canvas in a kind of frantic effort to erase what i'd done. 
needless to say, that did not work.
it ended up like this:


2} i doodled on some papers with a sharpie marker. i drew a girl flying a kite, and some stars, and some flowers, and some squiggles reminiscent of the things that decorated my social studies notes in grade 12. 


i arranged the doodles on the canvas to make sure they would fit. {they would.}


3} i scanned my doodles onto the computer, arranged them onto a word document, saved it as a jpeg, and took it to the printshop down the street, where it cost me $2 to get it printed off on a laser jet printer on ledger-sized paper. because my ink jet doesn't cut it.


4} i acquired some gloss gel from a neat little art shop around the corner. i painted five thin coats of the gloss gel over my picture, allowing it to dry in between coats.


5} after letting the last coat dry, which only really took about 15 minutes {which is a very good thing as i am totally impatient} i got to the fun part.
remember when you were in fifth grade and you were learning about the solar system and you hated the solar system and so instead of taking notes you drew a picture on your fingertip and poured a drop of glue on top and let it dry and then peeled it off and the picture transferred to the glue? 
that's my basic understanding of this process. 
except instead of just peeling the glue off of the paper, i flipped the whole thing upside down {in a pan full of water} and scrubbed the paper off with a toothbrush--revealing my doodles beneath! on a clear, flat glob of dried gel gloss. 




6} i plopped it down on my dried canvas {which i'd just painted a coat of gel gloss onto} and painted yet another coat of gel gloss on top of it, to make it stick. 
this is sort of how it turned out, minus the fact that in real life it's much less grainy and doesn't look like a crappy cell phone picture of a painting. 


all-in-all, kind of a fun little project.
i found it on this website a while back.

14 comments:

Chantelle said...

Promise me that some day (maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday) you'll write and illustrate a children's book for kids with HIV. Sweet and soft drawings about how it feels and how the future is bright and how people don't always understand but that's okay. Stuff like that.

Unknown said...

WOW. just... WOW this is amazing and beautiful and funny because you said you aren't artistic or whatever you said but DANG LOOK AT THIS MASTERPIECE. So beautiful.

kelly ann said...

your post showed up in my reader!!! VICTORY.

and i'm so happy it was this post... i love it. i've been wanting to try this gel gloss thing ever since i saw it on the girls with glasses, it's SO COOL. definitely going to do this very soon. yours turned out SO awesome! :)

<3

Gale said...

suzy! that is awesome! turned out looking so whimsical...hooray! i heart it.

Kayla said...

That is GENIUS.

Chess said...

That's gorgeous. I'd love to try something like that sometime. I used to play with similar stuff in my painting classes in high school. Great job!

Emily Jane said...

Beautiful, and your doodles are just gorgeous!

suzy said...

chantelle: that would be cool--i'll keep you posted. :)

cara: haha, thank you! i thought of you while i was painting it (because of the kite). :D

kelly ann! YES! i'm so glad. i was getting so frustrated with blogger. and i would absolutely LOVE to see what you'd come up with if you did this. please do it asap, and post the results.

gale: aw thank you! i was pretty happy with it. :)

kayla: well i can take no credit for the idea. i wish i could though... i need to think up something cool.

chess: please do! and post it, i'd love to see.

emily jane: thanks :D. i've always loved doodling, so this project was kind of perfect for me.

Anonymous said...

Ok...I have my own apartment now and the walls are devoid of artwork (I think you see where I'm going with this). SUZY...you should make me something pretty for my walls :) Because this little gem that you created is ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS!

suzy said...

crystal! would you for real hang up something i made!? i'd be so honoured. what colour? how big? i'll bring it to you in march!!! :D (yay!)

Amy @ AGirlCalledBeloved said...

this is so awesome! I've never seen anything like it!

Anonymous said...

OF COURSE...of course I'd hang up something you made!!! My walls are white and my furniture is dark brown so, really, it could be any color and any size :) But seriously...I would be SO pumped if I had orignal Suzy artwork to hang in my apartment!!!

I can't wait until March :)

Ashlee said...

YOUR POST IS IN GOOGLE READER! Hooray!

Secondly, wowza! How about this: you draw a picture for me, and I'll splatter paint on a canvas. Together, we will make some SICK art. Deal?

suzy said...

amylou: thanks! again, can't take credit for the idea, but it sure is a fun project. :)

crystal: well ok! yay! i love an excuse to art it up. and ps: i'm SO SO SO excited for march. i can't handle it. turns out we're coming up thursday and not leaving til SATURDAY. HOH! :D

ashlee: omagoodness! that would be so fun. i'm going to email you.