Journey

In the past month I have gotten a fair bit of painting done and also experimenting. Here is some more of what I was working on just before Christmas.

This is more in encaustics, but instead of small pieces with tissue and other papers in the wax as I showed in a post last month, I worked on a large board. Working large in encaustics is a LOT more work. It takes more effort to cover larger surfaces, as the molten wax and pigment harden up quite quickly once taken out on a brush or adhered to substrates and surfaces. It takes quite a while to create and build up and cover a large board like this one, which is 48 x 61 cm (19" x 24").

There were some very cool looking corrugated cardboard pieces around, quite large and so I dipped it in the wax and thus attached them to the board surface. It took several pieces to create a doorway. I like doorways, gates, portholes and windows. Basically vantage points to frame and see other scenes, or gateways to other places and experiences.

This piece is like my vantage point to a journey. I have a recurring image and dream about a journey, one in which the path is not clear until I am about to take the next step, and then all of a sudden it is presented to me... before that moment I did not know which way it would go or what it would look like, but then it magically becomes apparent and I can continue, knowing the way ahead.

The corrugated surface is like many sheds and buildings and rooflines here so perhaps it is symbolizing my journey to this life and home here. Even in the studio space at Salon Rouge Gallery (where I painted this), you can see the same shape and texture making up some of the Gallery walls behind me. The Gallery was formerly a mechanics shed and garage in its previous lifecycle and some of those original walls have been retained, offering some genuine character. I enjoyed using dark blues and greens and also making the surface look weathered and rusty. I used wax for that, building up the surface. The weathered bits are made of many shades of related colors and the rust is orange, dark red orange, yellow and orange-yellow hues.

Adhered onto the gateway's surface are some postage stamps, small items that make possible passage ways of their own, little tickets for messages and letters that will cover distance and time to get from senders to destinations. Perhaps they will accompany pleasant deliveries to their recipients ? I like to think they will.

The lettering came out well and I have created a blue sky vista beyond the portico here. The view beyond is created with layers of beeswax and paint in colors of buff, white, offwhite, and soft blues and cerulean. The surface has been scraped and polished to create the texture shown.

This piece reminds me to see the blue skies ahead.