On a Whim

I have been busy in the studio these days creating a new work for the monthly art challenge, Nature Gathered.

The theme for November is Fauna. Normally, we post our artworks within the corresponding days of a particular month, but because of the holidays the November deadline was extended into December.

I have finished my piece, and thought I would share some of the steps I took during this journey.

By definition Fauna means : animal life ; especially : the animals characteristic of a region, period, or special environment.

Although, I had the choice of incorporating any sort of animal into this artwork, I could not stop thinking about how closely the word Fauna sounded to the word Fawn.

After pondering this thought for well over a week, I decided to yield to this whim and select a Fawn as the main subject.



The background for this piece was very time consuming. Many, many layers of ink washes were applied to create the deepest blue of the heavens.

As with every other work that I have done for the art challenge, this idea of pattern and patterning has been a reoccurring theme. I wanted to continue along this path by mimicking the lines of the earth within the area of the sky.

So, I traced out the contours depicted in the grass and cut a crude stencil.

Using a very fine glitter, I applied swaths of tinsel to the dark blue of the painting.

Even though the sky seemed very alive with what looked like a brilliant starry night, I decided to add larger elements of interest. These unusual buttons were treasures found during my trip to Houston for the International Quilt show.


Here is the completed work.

Update 12/11: After posting the completed work, I continued to feel as if it was missing something. Since Tuesday, I have been on the hunt for just the right finishing touch. I discovered that perfect piece today while rummaging through a jar of various buckles.

At the bottom of the jar, there was a mother-of-pearl buckle simply begging to be used. Although oversized for the artwork, it makes the perfect half-moon and a nice balance to the fawn.
So, here is the completed work with a slight revision.

I invite you to visit the Nature Gathered blog to see other nature inspired artworks!