Sunday, June 5, 2011

Ferns on Milkweed Paper

Yesterday's preparations were quickly tossed by the wayside when the paint resisted application--too thin and not enough. Out came the Golden acrylics, big gobs of the paints mixed right on the palette with a house painting brush. That thick, luscious paint went so nicely on my cinnamon fern fronds.

Cinnamon Fern

Milkweed paper mounted on foamcore

First color applied

Next color applied

Final two colors applied

4 comments:

  1. Printmaking is addictive- watch out! Looks like you had fun doing this project; I don't know my ferns well and was surprised to see that the cinnamon ferns were the huge ones- you are brave to have chosen them to print with. Will you try different inks and papers, too? I am wondering if a basic water soluble block printing ink like speedball would be worth experimenting with on such a large fern- I'm thinking it would have a longer "open" time to aid you in getting a more complete image vs. acrylics which dry so fast. Hope you do some more of these and share them here; they look great!
    ~ gretchen

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  2. Thanks Gretchen! With your comments and questions and my thoughts on the whole process, there is a post in that. More soon!

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  3. This was a very worthwhile activity if it produced so many questions. I enjoyed the finished image as well as your thought processes. The paper has an interesting texture-it would be good to try something smoother too. This could be a whole summer's project....

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  4. I think you're right, a smoother paper would help a good deal. Not quite sure how that escaped me when I got started! :-) Well actually, I'd been itching to try that paper out since picking some up last summer. Perhaps reversing would help, that is working in negative space with an airbrush. I don't have one, yet...

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