Sunday 3 April 2016

PaperArtsy Challenge #6 - Fabric Sculpting Entry

Hi Everying

I hope you're all having a lovely Sunday.  We have (my kind of) perfect weather here today with lovely sunshine, a little breeze and very comfy temperature!

Over on the PaperArtsy blog for the past two weeks the guest designers have been putting various fabric stiffeners through their paces and have shown us some amazing artwork from wall art to dolls as well as my own offering of the doily vase which you can see here if you missed it.  The very interesting introductory post by our lovely talented Darcy is HERE.

After making my guest designer piece I really wanted to make a piece of wall art the basics of which I've had in my head for quite a while and amazingly I managed to finish it this afternoon just in time to beat the deadline for the challenge.  I was so enjoying the whole process from start to finish of making this piece that I forgot to take many progress pics but this post is still a bit photo heavy so apologies in advance, lol!.




I started with an 8" x 8" wooden deep sided piece of wall art I bought as part of a triptych ages ago.  I bought them with the intention of altering them as they were very cheap and very boring, lol!  


I gave it coats of gesso followed by dabbing several neutral shades of Fresco Finish acrylic paints with wet wipes, a clean one for each colour.  I then did some stamping with Archival Inks as well as some Frescos using stamps from various Hot Picks sets plus a couple of PaperArtsy Minis.  I stencilled a couple of leaf fronds from Lin Brown (for PaperArtsy) stencils using Mud Splat Fresco then bumping the stencil slightly and using Chalk Fresco.  I stamped the pretty flower from HP1009 and coloured the flowers with pencils.


I then covered the top two thirds and also a little vase with cling film.  I positioned the vase then soaked a piece of old cotton Tshirting in Bronze Powertex and arranged it in folds and ripples over the bottom third and over the vase taking the fabric round to the back of the wall art.


Once the fabric had cured overnight (I helped it along with my hairdryer ;D) I then started adding little sand balls to the folds.  I found the easiest way to do this to get them where I wanted was to pour a drop of Powertex into a plastic dish (I used a plum tray that I keep as a palette), drop the balls in and then pick them out one by one with tweezers to place on my art piece.  I find the Bronze Powertex is much runnier than the Ivory and next time I'm coating the sand balls I will leave it to thicken a bit before taking them out as at first it wasn't sticking.
 

This shows the stamping on the sides.
 

A closer look at the main stamping and stencilling after taking the protective cling film off.
 

I added shades of bronze and blue of various mica paints and pastes including Treasure Gold  to highlight the textures.

A final look at the piece with some pretty gentians and a grape hyacinth from my garden in the little vase.

I had a ball making this piece and am really happy with how it turned out.  It is very rare that I actually finish with something that is close to what I had in my head, lol!

Okey dokey, I'm off to do the link up with less than an hour to spare!!!  Enjoy the rest of your Sunday and see you again soon.

Hugs
Lesley  Xx

9 comments:

Helen said...

Lesley this is gorgeous! I love the stamping and your little vase of real flowers from your garden

Lin said...

oh Lesley this is gorgeous !! very unusual xxx

Darcy Marshall said...

wow this is fabulous, love seeing this product used in more unusual ways.

Sarah B said...

really love this Lesley, such a fantastic idea. The addition of the vase for real flowers is genius xxx

Hazel Agnew said...

Another great piece Lesley....lovely finish and useful too! Xx

Aquarius said...

This is amazing and you obviously had a great time creating it. It is really good to have truly original artwork around you in the home rather than mass produced 'home decor'.

Sue's Crafty Corner said...

I love this amazing piece that you've created here Lesley. The texture at the bottom looks so organic and the beautiful canvas behind is a great backdrop for the flowers.

Sue xx

Ruth said...

Another fabulous piece, you have powertex nailed. Love the stone tones and 'sand balls' intrigue me? Amazing textural and natural effect. Love it! Ruth xx

Words and Pictures said...

So inspired - what a great idea to incorporate the little vase, and it looks so lovely with the stamped and textured florals too. Beautiful neutrals and that gentle touch of blue, and simply amazing texture within the fabric.
Alison x