I love artwork. As a kid, if I wasn't playing basketball or soccer, I was in our basement drawing, painting or looking through books for something to draw or paint. Ink wash artwork that has always been a favorite medium. Maybe because it has a similar consistency to watercolors or because it doesn't require the setup of oils, it's just a brush, a small bottle of ink (your carpet's worst nightmare) and water. Anyway, most of my design work is done on the computer and I love it, but being able to set the computer aside and create some artwork for some up-coming art auctions in town is a nice change of pace.
Last year, I donated a painting to a charity auction in Greenville and really had a great time attending the event and seeing all the artwork. There is still a lot of mediums I want to work with, but without much time in the evenings to set aside, going back to some ink wash work has been a good transition. I plan on doing some still life compositions and some nautical themed landscapes besides the animals, but there is something about the emotion in developing the eyes and expression of an animal that is really fun.
The texture of an elephant's skin really makes it a fun animal to work on. I really liked working with a splatter technique that gives a gravel type of look for the ground. I loaded up the brush with ink and water and smacked the brush sending splatters on the bottom of the artwork, our kitchen floor and a couple probably on my wife's cat :). The cat has been a problem whenever sketching out the layouts for sure, always smacking at the pencil and walking on the paper. Anyway, there is some things I would have changed for sure, but still am excited the way this turned out. It's a larger piece that many I have done in the past and really will stand out when paired with a black matte and frame.
The octopus with all the suction cups was really fun to work on. I wanted the background to be very dark but also have some personality in the black with some areas lighter than others and I really like how there is slight splatters here and there,and brush strokes throughout. All in all, it was fun to do these first two and hope to start work on a few others soon. Planning on doing some canvas prints (Giclée as the pros say) and matte/frame up the originals as well.
