A Rose-y Sort of Moment (Silk Painting and ACEO)

As other Etsians know fairly well, I love to trade. I think bartering is one of the best concepts mankind ever came up with, and it's a shame that we don't do it more. Lucky for me, many Etsians feel the same way, and I'm even luckier to have found some amazing artists to trade with.

Take StaciRose, creatrix behind (surprisingly enough) Staci Rose Designs. She makes the most incredible positive energy jewelry I've seen in quite some time. Her work is amazingly affordable and stunningly beautiful. I *always* get compliments when I wear her work.

Anywhoo, she has a listing up for customized earrings for mothers, and I thought they would be perfect for my mother-in-law. I asked her if she'd be willing to trade, and she said yes. But she wanted something special. Something custom. An original ACEO.

I confessed that my ACEOs are nothing more than photographs of my silk paintings, and she was fine with that. She wanted something original, that I came up with. Well, my other (until now) unspoken confession is that I haven't been inspired to paint in awhile, but I've missed it. I've been wanting to do something nature-inspired, so I sent her a list of words that I wanted to work with to get her reactions. I based my painting off of those (granted, I don't think a single one of the words I provided or her associations are directly in there, but I do know that they helped me get an idea out of my head and onto the silk).

This painting was the first I've done that involved multiple resist applications. There were areas that I wanted to have color-on-color, with no white-space in between, so I had to move back and forth between the sink, the iron, and the painting table in order to get all the colors laid down. I also wanted to provide a "ready to hang" painting, and I know from experience that silk is extremely difficult to mat and frame. So I placed it into a hoop with a hanging loop.

The image itself was simple. The sun in the sky over mountains with snow, the arid hills, a fertile meadow, a flowering bush, and a brook with fish in it. It encompassed the changingness of the water, had a decent amount of color, showed the life that eminates from the sun... I was originally going to try and encompass all four seasons, but after wrd association, it seemed like I should go in a different direction. I overlayed colors in the meadow and I salted the stream and and the sky. The finished painting turned out far better than I originally thought it would.

Setting it in the hoop was an entirely different story. I ended up using scissors, a hot glue gun, and gads of patience. The result is a 5.5 x 4" oval original... the smallest I've done yet. It makes a pretty nice ACEO, too.

Lessons learned:
1) Put the silk in one hoop size larger than your finished hoop so you don't have to cover the gap lines
2) Salt is cool
3) Baby wash is a multi-tasker
4) Multiple resist painting is challenging and fun

I just hope Staci is as impressed as I am.