Basic Faces and Smoothing Wrinkles

The wrinkle in my Art Nouveau/Rosemaling piece has been smoothed. The main cause of this wrinkle was to much water meets to light of weight paper. I typically use Stonehenge paper as it is versatile, has a nice weight, and is Made in the U.S.A. In most situations, it actually wrinkles less than tradiditional watercolor paper. Applying multiple layers of color and water to the Stonehenge paper seems to break it down. I have found correcting these wrinkles is a little differently than you would do with standard watercolor paper. It is actually important to lay down more color with a light hand to create a heavy wax layer that builds up the paper. It took me two days of layering, lightly wetting and flat-weighting, but the nasty wrinkle along my young Norwegian maidens face is now gone and I can get back to work doing finishing details.

I started the face detailing on my Americana piece also. Everything done so far was done with Neocolor II crayons. I had some bleed off into her teeth. She looks like she has been enjoying a nice Cabernet. My next step will be to continue with The crayons going through and softening up all the details giving everything a bit more of an aged look.

I have started drawing out a third piece which I plan to use the Neocolor II crayons as the main base. Just looking at what I have done so far, I can really see the differences in these products. I am also coming up with a pretty lengthy list of each products merits and downfalls.

Art Nouveux Meets Rosemaling-Part One, Faber-Castell Gelatos

After several days of experimenting with Faber-Castell Gelatos using some of the more common techniques, I was about to throw in the towel. Used dry, I felt like they didn't move enough. Spritzed on a gessoed surface I found them to be grainy. I decided to instead use them like watercolors. After applying to a ceramic surface, I added water with a dropper and mixed colors with a palette knife ( both of which were found in Gelatos Tool Set). I then used a water pen to apply colors to a line drawing done on Stonehenge paper with varying sizes of black Micron pens.

I find large Corelle-ware plates work great for mixing colors. The are as big as a large tile, but the curve of the plate keeps any water from escaping. The Faber-Castell Mix & Match Gelatos Tool Set (pictured) comes with some of the most commonly used tool for Gelato application.

The pigments of the Gelatos took on a very delicate look when used with a water pen. They reminded me of the colors that would be seen in Art Nouveux pieces, but at the same time they brought to mind some Norwegian textiles that I have. I decided to combine Art Nouveux style with traditional Rosemaling.

Here is the piece filled in with the Gelatos. As there are limited colors available in this line, this is probably all that I will do with this product line on this piece. Stay tuned for the next segment as I continue to work.