The Mixed Media Artist - Step-By-Step-Old and New Friends Meet

Today on Seth Apter's blog the fourteen gallery artists from section three of The Mixed-Media Artist, Seth's latest book, are being introduced.  I have three pieces in this book and I thought it would be fun to show you the steps that I took to create Old and New Friends Meet, the piece that I created for the book.  The prompt for Friends was Imaginary Worlds.  I am so very pleased to have been asked to be included in Seth's book.  If you have not seen it yet, it is a treat!  Thanks Seth for asking me to contribute.

 

 

 



I used matte medium to adhere pieces of newspaper to the substrate in the first step.  Then I brayered a layer of gesso over the substrate.

step 1

In step 2, I added paint using rainbow colors.  As you can see texture is now coming through from step 1.

step 2

Since I was honoring four great 20th century artists I wanted to give a flavor of their work in my piece.  I create gel skins transfers using gloss gel medium.

 

step 3

After four gloss gel medium coats and once the skin is dry, I submerged the skin in water to wet the paper fibers.

step 4

 In step 5 the rubbing off of the paper fibers begins.

step 5

Step 6 is a completed gel skin for the background.  I completed several different gel skins to represent four artists' work: Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Keith Haring and Andy Warhol.

step 6

 In step 7, I adhered the gel skins to the painted background.

step 7

 Another layer of gesso was added to the work in step 8.

step 8



I added a glaze over the gessoed layer and then added the decapitated bodies of Rauschenberg, Johns, Haring, and Warhol.

 

step 9

Because Donatello, Caravaggio, Michelangelo and da Vinci are using time travel to visit the 20th century artists their heads were added to the bodies of the other artists.  Finally, I sprayed slide covers with a black gloss and attached the covers to the artists.

step 10