Framing Your Art: The Devil Is In the Details

My mom recently put on a great show at the Sooke Harbour House. I especially loved how she unified her various styles of artwork by framing them all in the same frames; grey stained wood.

I decided to hit up her carpenter (my dad) for some frames of my own. Luckily for me, my carpenter dad works for home made raisin pie! So one rhubarb crisp and a raisin pie later, I had in my possession 4 new raw wood frames. And my inspiration was barnboard!

I wanted to share with you the process of staining raw wood frames to look like faux weathered barn board.

Materials:
matte grey stain (I used Varathane "Sunbleached")
matte white paint (I used primer)
matte grey paint (I used primer)
matte black paint (I used left over house paint)
sandpaper
rags
brush
varnish (I use Minwax Polycrylic)


Step 1:
I began by lightly staining the wood a light grey. I used Varathane "Sun Bleached" stain. Paint a generous layer of the stain on, let sit for 15 minutes, then wipe off.



 

The raw unpainted frame



 

a layer of grey stain

Step 2:
Using the dry brush method, loosely paint a streaky layer of white primer on top of the grey stain.



 

white primer

 

Step 3:
Again using the dry brush method, add another streaky layer of matte grey paint. I just used leftover primers from painting around my house.



 

light grey matte paint

 

Step 4 and 5:

Either use a darker grey matte paint or add some black into your light grey paint for this next layer. Dry brush on a coat of the darker grey. Use the matte black paint to splatter paint the frame. Use a rag to rub black paint into knot holes and any imperfections on the wood.

 

 

dark grey matte paint and black

 

 

Step 5 and 6:

Lightly sand the wood and add a final layer of the original pale grey stain over top of all the other layers. Varnish the wood.

 

 

 

The last layers: grey stain and clear varnish

 

Here is sample board I created for future reference:

 

 

 

Frankie and Echo want to know, "How do we look in our new frames?"

 

Echo incognito as "Sidekick"

 

Frankie is a "Funny Girl".

 



 

 

 



 



Wild and Precious

"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"

Mary Oliver

 

 

"Size: Wild and Precious"

30" x 30"

 

 

This painting is all about layers. It is actually several paintings, each layered on top of each other.

 

I began simply by painting ornamental circles.

 

Then I transferred an image I had sketched on a large piece of paper.

 

Once I had the image transferred, I began color blocking the second layer of the painting. This included both the figure and repainting new circles on top of the old ones.

 

 

 As I continued to paint the figure, I made sure the layers from the previous painting would show through. I love how the circles show through on her arm.

 

 

The third layer of the painting involved reclaiming some of the previous background designs by adding detailed white pin stripes.

 

 

 

The final touch: using a subtle and lighter shade of blue to highlight around the design elements.

 

The final painting shows evidence of four very distinct layers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rescued Monsters

"Quickly I turned on the light and caught him sitting at the foot of my bed."

 

 

 

Mason's old sweater "Hugger" on the eve of Mason's birthday.

The year I learned to knit, I hand knit monster sweaters for my two boys and husband for Christmas. They were the first sweaters I made for someone else. And man, were they cute!  Every time my husband wears his, someone asks him where he got it. Recently I found Mason's sweater; too small, cast aside and sporting a hole. And yet, he was completely unwilling to part with it. It was after all the first sweater his mommy had ever knit him. And guess who's birthday was just around the corner? So I patched the hole with a felted heart and gave this monster a new lease on life.

 

Matty's sweater "Horace" was adopted last year. He really likes his new owner. She probably lets him stay up late watching movies.

Strange Beginnings

Sometimes in creating art, unexpected things happen. Sometimes I like to start out with the unexpected; with strange beginnings. This series began while pondering the dubious parentage of my muse. A pit bull terrier whippet cross named Frankie. Strange beginnings indeed! And our other little mixed rescue... a rat terrier daschound chihuahua cross? Really, it's anyone's guess.

 

a detail of my Frankie girl

For this series I wanted to start the paintings on materials inspired by my dogs. Materials that had been cast aside and then rescued by me. I painted on used tissue pattern pieces destined for the recycle bin and torn, discarded Japanese tissue papers that I hand painted on top of in a previous project.

 

Much of the portraits were painted using a palette knife and a toothbrush; scraping, layering, scrubbing and splattering the images on top of the tissue and torn paper bits.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Final Projects

 

 

"Sidekick"

30" x 40" acrylic on tissue and canvas

 

 

 

"Funny Girl"

30" x 40" acrylic on tissue and canvas

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Loosen Up and Let Go.

"It took me 4 years to paint like Raphael, but a life time to paint like a child."
-Pablo Picasso

 

"Curiosity"

8" x 8" clay, paper and acrylic on wood

 

 

I  love working with children; and every time I do I swear I learn as much from them as they do from me.

Always.

It is a collaboration.

 

 

 

I recently had a group of girls visit my studio. For three hours they drew, painted, sculpted , and collaged their hearts out. There was never any hesitation; only unbridled enthusiasm and fearlessness. Never any criticism; only joy with their creation. This is always the lesson I learn.

 

 

 

 

Children don't worry if their work is sellable. They have no critics. They paint simply to express themselves. Who cares if nothing comes from it? So loosen up, let go and learn to paint like a child. From the heart!

 

 

 

 

 

Call and Response

"Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart".

William Wordsworth

 

Last night I sat around a table with four of my favorite people: my mother, my dear friend Caroline and her daughter Zoe. Four women between the ages of 18 and 60. We had gathered together for a fun art experiment: Call and Response. Each of us began an art piece; a  call. The art was then passed to the next of us, and so on. We did not see our art for the next two hours. There was conversation everywhere... two pots of tea were drunk, and we used our heart's breathings to respond to each other's call. No mark ever fell on neutral ground.

 

Angela's Call: Till She Can Bring Her Beauty

 

 

The Response: She Must be The Beast

 

 

Bonnie's Call: Angle of Destination?

 

 

The Response: The sun sets each day, so it may rise again.

 

 

 

Zoe's Call

 

 

The Response

 

 

Caroline's Call: real beauty, old age, wrinkled, get older, every wrinkle, smile line, marks of wisdom

 

The Response: her beauty, your eyes.

 

 

 

 

Can't you just feel our hearts? Don't you wish you were there?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

April: Conversations In Paint

I like the idea of collaborations as conversations. Keith Haring once said, "Collaboration paintings are a physical conversation in paint instead of words. The sense of humor, the snide remarks, the profound realizations, the simple chit chat all happened with paint and brushes."

I recently collaborated with my mother, Bonnie Coulter, to create a conversation about the precarious nature of emotional states.

 

"Hold Back The Storm"

 In "Hold back The Storm", Bonnie envisioned an emotional storm, and she used her experience with painting landscapes to speak about this.

 

After years of studying psychology, I first became a mother and then a portrait artist. I'm often thrown into the eye of the storm of adolescent hormones and fears as my boys and their friends navigate their way through their teens. This experience became my part of the conversation.

 

 

All month long I will be exploring collaborative art: joint paintings, call and response, commissions and working with kids.