anatomy of some very large paintings ......

photo 1 (below): this is a four foot by six foot canvas ..... and in the far right corner, you can see where i have started putting on my collage elements ..... the canvas was as long as my table ... so, i propped one end of the canvas on the table, the close end of it is propped up on chairs .... 

photo 2: the canvas is filled with my first layer .... all papered with maps and dictionary and bingo and book pages ..... you can see the chairs that the canvas is propped up on .... 

photo 3: i did a turqoise wash on the canvas, then a layer of tissue paper for added texture, then some more opaque blues and turqoises .... all that is to add more texture, color variation and interest ..... 
photo 4: now i'm stenciling large letters .... i've chosen a bluesy turquoise that is a titch darker than the darkest paint on my canvas ..... we haven't used country crock for years, but i still have loads of those tubs that i use while painting .. i use the lids as palettes ..... i'm using a sponge brush ..... i used that stencil square 24 times ... plus a bit more for the two inches around two edges where those 24 hadn't reached to the edge .... that's a LOAD of stamping ....
photo five: here's a close up of four by six feet of turquoise canvas with darker stenciling .... from a distance it just looks turquoise ... from here you see the lettering ... up closer, you can still see the map of iowa, bingo numbers and dictionary entries ....
picure 6: there's my dark turquoise on turquoise background .... ready to go ...waiting for me to be brave enough to add the foreground ..... my sept. 1 deadline is looming ..... and what is this canvas standing behind? another canvas ... also six feet by four feet ... ready to go ......

picture 7: this second canvas used a a bradenton florida aaa map ... i love triple a maps because they are all blues and gorgeous ..... there's a south carolina map , bingo cards, pages from a music appreciation book, and my butchered dictionary .....

picture 8: here's the second canvas.... i papered it, glazed it, tissued it, heavy body acryliced it ..... 

picture nine: for this one, i used lighter turquoise for my stencil letters ..... so, though the first color is the same for the two canvases, they have very different looks .... one dark, this one much lighter because of the light lettering .....

picture 10.....whew! on the right you can see the darker stencil canvas, on the left is the second canvas with lighter stencil paint .... 

so ... that's loads of work, huh? i've not been showing you my process as i've been going along, thinking that it would be boring to have ten or so days of posts dedicated to this .....so instead, this is the compilation of many days of work ..... (i wish paint dried faster) .... and now all you have to do is come back soon and see what i might do to finish these out ... these are due to kristy at lola's gallery by the last day of this month .... so she can hang them at the roswell cultural arts center for the month of september ..... 

at one point today, i was painting, mr.e.beck.artist was sitting with me chatting, boy.beck.artist was in the basement watching a tv show, girl.beck.artist was on the computer, little.e.beck artist was flitting about between us all .... and i said, mr.e.beck.artist, this very minute is perfection.... all my people are with me ....and i'm painting ..... everyone is happy .... ahhhhhh! 

what was your happy minute today?