Monday, May 10, 2010

Evolution of a painting....a la Moulin Rouge.


I went away to Winnipeg Beach this past week to take on the [ad]venture of doing a large-esque painting for my cousin Brandi. We were chatting in her hot tub a few weeks ago, and she mentioned that they are looking for a big piece of art for their big blank wall, and me being the ever-eager gal with a paintbrush, I volunteered myself to take on the task! Good thing she trusted me :)

Here's how it all came together. Painting is good for the soul!

After I designed the painting on my computer, from pieces of photos and vintage French paintings, I printed out a life-size template in letter-sized panels, to transfer onto the canvas. [Which is 5 foot x 3 foot.] This is me outwardly saying ACK! I am going to paint this! :) I love a good challenge.

This is in Wpg Beach now, getting it all set up to start the painting process!

Smiling with a blank canvas! [Before the work began :) ]

Gettin' all the paints and pallettes and brushes and jazz ready to rock!

I mixed the background colour, and began to give it a good thick coat! I love painting with a big brush, it's so liberating! [I am a painting geek, aren't I?]

Lookit the speed of my brush, it's like SuperBrush!

After the bg colour dried, I began the arduous process of measuring and uber-carefully transferring the template onto the canvas. Since it was in pieces, and had so much detail, I had to make SURE it was completely accurate. I didn't breathe much through these few hours!

Yay, finally beginning the painting, near the end of Day 1!

It's tough to paint it in portions, mixing and fixing as I go... just because I know how I want it to look at the end of it all, and it's tough to push through the ugly unfinished stages!

Finished the gal in the corner, now moving onto the big letters!

Big brush on the big letters.

It's starting to come together, yahoo!

Now the tower is getting close to done, minus the windmill....

Phew! The windmill is done, WHAT a seige of little straight lines! No breathing there either :)

I took a little lying down break to stretch my back, it's tough to hover over a big canvas, as I found out!

Done the dancing silhouettes...moving onto the last big corner with the 2 ladies on horses.

Startin' on the horses now....stay in the lines, stay in the lines....




Gettin' closer....

Finishing off the wrap-around edges!

Done!! A view from the one side....

....and the other.

Yay! No longer a blank canvas! 4 days & a lot of paint later :)

Yahooooo! Done-o! I learned a lot, and it definitely encouraged me to paint more! I am super pumped it turned out, since I have never painted anything this big before.

Onto the next creative [ad]venture...

5 comments:

csteingart said...

Well that's flippin dope! She better paid ya good money for dat.

And who's watching The Golden Girls in the first photo!? lol

Pete Emslie said...

That's great, Stacey! I really like your arrangement of the various elements into such a pleasing design. I am curious though why you couldn't have worked upright on an easel instead of flat on the floor?

Stacey Chomiak said...

Thanks Chris!! Yah, we were watchin' Golden Girls, I will admit it :)

Thanks for the thumbs up Pete! As for your easel comment... since we drove to Wpg Beach to do the painting, I only had so much room to bring supplies. Plus, I only have a small easel that this 5 foot by 3 foot canvas would totally overwhelm! We propped it up against a chair for most of it and that helped a lot! You live and learn :)

rngnt99 said...

WOW!!!! Great Job!!!!!

Stacey Chomiak said...

Hey thanks so much Christin! I checked out your profile and blog. I love your work!