Accumulate

I'm not going to bore you with why it has been so long since I have written a post. I'll just say I was away from home for a few days. Since then, I've been busy and sometimes there are not enough hours in the day to get it all done.

I have been messing around with a piece of art. I call it Accumulate since that is how it was created, a bit at a time. Also, dealing with my accumulation of stuff is one of the things keeping me so busy lately. OK, I admit it. I am a pack rat.

It started out to be my week 6 project for the Summer of Color, two oranges and a blue, which I did not finish in time. Since I was over the deadline, I decided to add some other colors. I was really having a problem with the limitation of colors, too much like monochrome.

I originally started out with the 14" X 11" paper in landscape to which I added a bit of Liquitex Super Heavy Gesso on part of the paper to add some texture. In case you have never used it, it is like a thick cake icing that you spread with a palette knife. Some people like to pile it on, but I usually use a more moderate amount.

Once it dried, I painted on some messy geometric shapes, using blue, two oranges, and a brown I mixed from blue and orange. I added some blue-striped washi tape and a chevron pattern with a homemade stamp and blue paint. That's where I was when my time for SOC6 ran out.

It remained on my art table. I would look at it once in a while, wondering where to go from there. One rainy afternoon I got out my stencils and a sponge to make several additions in orange. Boring! I remembered a green I had made by mixing the blue and orange. It would be dark though. I decided to use the brighter Golden Green Gold instead. When I started outlining, I wanted something besides fluorescent orange. I used fluorescent yellow. I was feeling much better after adding some more bright colors.

Over the next couple of weeks I added the flower beside the washi tape, the dots to the chevrons, and the circle-sticks marks. While I was turning the paper to make my colored scribbles on my circle-sticks, I decided I liked the piece better in portrait orientation. It took nearly four weeks, a bit added here and a bit added there before this accumulation of bits was finished. Yes, I know it is a big mess, but that's what happens when you accumulate things. If I ever get this place cleaned out, I resolve to stop accumulating things.

Supplies used:

• 14 in. X 11 in., 140lb. Strathmore 400 series Mixed Media Paper
• Liquitex Super Heavy Gesso
• Amsterdam Standard Acrylic Paint: Primary Cyan, Azo Orange, Prussian Blue
• Liquitex Interference Orange
• Golden High Flow Fluorescent Orange
• Golden Matte Acrylic Green Gold
• stencils from the Crafter's Workshop
• Molotow One4All Acrylic Paint Markers
• Sakura Gelly Roll Moonlight Gel Pens
• Blue Fude Ball 1.5 Pen
• Black Stabilo CarbOthello Pastel Pencil