The Journey of Painting Glass

I am a collector. There are baskets of doll parts around the house, inside the gumball machine, inside the glass jars on my dining room table to keep the seashells company, and then there are my glass spheres that live within all of my weirdness, each beside a natural light source, and glow with life at unsuspecting moments. These spheres are where my Ardithian imagination gets its ideas, and I could live in them if I was able....they just magically draw me in. 

Painting glass is no small feat, especially with watercolors. In fact, I have only painted 3 glass paintings in the past 10 years, not because I dislike them, but because they are such a challenge that my back and neck scream with rebellion at the mere thought of me thinking about it. That was until a few weeks ago when I had to choose one of two subjects to paint for an upcoming show. The glass called out to me, and I decided it was time to let the paint flow again. 

Oh, the stinky frisket! 

The challenge is exactly what I remember, not painting the glass but painting the reflections in the glass. So far, I am pleased with my progress but the soul in me that loves slinging paint, making marks, and being loose with acrylic is cringing with all of the tight control necessary for this type of painting. I wish I had the physical ability to paint huge pieces, crawling up on a ladder to paint the tops of things, and getting down on the floor to paint low, but for today, I will be content with painting 'fairly large' for me. 

There are still many layers and glazes that will come for this piece, and I look forward to seeing it come to fruition. My mixed media spirit does as well, :) 

The pic above shows the addition of the dark values, or at least some of them. 

Love mixing yellow and deep violet to create darks. 

4/20th added more darks, more glazes, working on capturing the values I am looking for! 

Finally, after weeks of working on this piece with a bad back and all I am done. There are things I would have done differently had I been physically able, but considering how challenging it was with my back, I am thrilled with how it turned out. 

"The Reflections in Creation"

20" by 30" 

Watercolor