There is something I learned over my years as an artist, or even just as a creative person: you can not control everything. You can try, that’s for sure, but there is slight chance that this is a waste of your energy.
I want to master my art, just for me. Because I like to know how media react with each other, what works for me and what doesn’t. What makes my heart sing and what makes my Soul sink. However… I discovered that once I open myself to the serendipity of things, this is when I channel best what is meant to become.
This is what I was reminded with this small painting, Louise. She intuitively came together, and actually was more of a warm up. I sketched her in charcoal and used left over paint from bigger projects to bring her to life.
I love putting some color on their cheek area, more or less vibrant depending on my mood. I wanted to do it differently on her an added a drop of Alcohol Ink instead of paint or oil pastel. I don’t know if you are familiar with this product, but I find these inks VERY unpredictable and this is specifically why I love them so much. It comes in a small bottle with a small tip to use as the applicator. What you see as her cheeks is the tiniest drop I could do. Despite the paint underneath, it sank right into the woodgrain and spread. I could have freaked out and maybe I did a little in the first seconds, but instead I squeeled of delight and did not even tried to “fix” it.
Once I felt like she was finished, because she is on such a small surface, I covered her with soft gloss gel… this is when the big gloops happened: I forgot Alcohol Ink reacts to water based anything, so it spread a bit all over… AND there must have been some white left over pint on the tool I picked to apply the gel because you can see a pretty big dollop of white, unplanned, covering her left eye. Well, it taught me a valuable lesson: everything can change, nothing is permanent, a mistake is a mistake only if you say so.
Pssst: Louise is looking for a new home, message me if interested.