Art journal experiments with recycled paintings.

Greetings from Kerinci, Indonesia. We are enjoying tropical weather and getting spoiled rotten by our hosts! I will share some photos from here next week when I have gotten them downloaded to one place. Until then I have some art journal pages that I haven't shared with you yet.

It is not always that my watercolour efforts result in finished paintings. If I do not love it, I recycle it. This way I feel like the time I spend painting a watercolour that failed wasn't totally wasted, and I can turn them into sketches for future paintings. It is a great way of trying out and experimenting with backgrounds. I cut out the subject, and glue them in my art journal on new and different backgrounds.

This Blacked-Capped chickadee is from a watercolour where I tried to use salt in the background. The result wasn't too bad, but I didn't love it. I had another idea for it, so this is what it became. I like these colours, so I will probably try and paint it again on watercolour paper like this. (Reference photo from Joe Price from the facebook group Photos for artists.)

Another chickadee that got recycled. I think I chose the wrong kind of paper for my first attempt at a watercolour painting for this one. I used cold pressed paper, but I think I need hot pressed paper to get the effect I want. This background is painted with watercolour on a gessoed page, the same as the previous page. (Reference photo from Joe Price from the facebook group Photos for artists.)

This and the next owl is from the inktober challenge that I participated in. Neither of them became something that I was totally happy with, so I decided to try out two different coloured backgrounds in my art journal for them. The owls are painted in ink and acrylic inks, but the backgrounds are again with watercolour on a gesso. 

They are pygmy owls, and the reference photo is from Pixabay.

My art journal is getting quite thick, and I do not have many pages left in it. It will soon be time to film a 'flip through' of it. Long-tailed tit. I am still not sure what kind of background I would like for this small cutie, but this was one experiment. (Ref .photo by Peter Skillen from the FB-group 'Photos for artists')

And last but not least I have a finished painting. Venus slipper orchid, acrylic and oil on canvas, 40x30 cm.

Have a beautiful weekend everyone!