Get up. Get dressed. Paint. Sacred transformation painting

Painting the exercises in Paint Mojo is quite different than painting along with Rae Missigman’s 15 Minutes of Mixed Media.  I did not anticipate the time investment involved in each piece.  I had gotten used to completing a paining in an hour or two each Saturday morning.  This new journey takes over a week because of the various layers.  I find myself getting impatient, anxious to get it done, frustrated because I have to wait for the layer to dry before I can continue. 

Spirit is imparting a lesson and I am protesting!  

Step 1: paint your thoughts.  This took me almost an hour.  It was liberating, and frustrating at the same time as I would get a burst of thoughts then nothing.  I would sit looking at the rest of the blank page knowing I had to fill it before I could continue but my mind was having none of it.

Steps 2 & 3: wipe your words with a paper towel then cover them with a coat of thinned down gesso.  Because I took so long to get the words down, the paint had mostly dried and there was little paint to smear.

Step 4: Using an oil pastel, draw a spiral and create a design inside the spiral.

Step 5: Using harmonious colors and white, use your fingers to apply the paint in your spiral.

I know nothing about the color wheel so I had to do some investigating to figure out what harmonious colors were.  She used reds, oranges, and yellows.  Not wanting to imitate her totally I went with the cool colors.

Steps 6 & 7: I inadvertently skipped step 6 which was to spray water on the wet paint then let it run down the page. The next step was to paint a symbol; I chose to paint the butterfly like she did thinking I would repeat this lesson again using something different.

Step 8: paint in the area around the butterfly using bold strokes and allowing your paint to blend.  This was challenging for me and I ended up painting it twice. Once I got the hang of allow the paints to blend and mix I didn't want to stop!

Note:  I painted over the dark outline and antennas which meant having to repaint this.

This is the finished piece.  I was so engrossed I missed taking step photos here.

Step 9:  Introduce a new color and paint the tips of the wings.  Here I goofed up.  My lack of understanding the color wheel got me into trouble.  I followed her lead and painted them turquoise. I then realized she chose turquoise because it was a cool color, the opposite of the warm colors she used in here butterfly.  I needed to paint with a warm color.  Painting over the turquoise with yellow was hard, it took 3 coats of heavy body acrylic paint to cover it.  

 Step 10 Use the ink dropper to draw your main design then play with a bamboo skewer to pull the ink away to create a more intricate design.
Note:  I did purchase the Flame Orange and Sundown Magenta (pearlescent) but not the silver. I improvised and used silver metallic paint and a paint brush on the top wings.

I found when using the ink dropper that my line was too think in some spots while too thin in others.  And using the bamboo skewer to draw with...  I ended up tossing it aside and reaching for my brush.

I don't like how the orange line varies from thick to thin back to thick.  

Step 11 Add design using white paint and flame orange ink.  

What I learned

• These lessons are meant to be meditative, drawing slowly and deliberately, creating with intent.  I have a lot to learn painting in this manner.
• I need to continue practicing using the inks and learning to control the flow of ink from the dropper. I love the color of the sundown magenta and will be using it often.
• Using the color wheel; I got a glimpse of how to use it but I have so much more to learn!  But I don't want to find myself loosing my intuitiveness, and instead finding myself stopping to think about which color goes with which.  I need to learn to balance this, but how?

Joining Paint Party Friday where having paint under the fingernails is the norm.  What colors are under yours?