Stylized Painted Box - Part 3

I started to add embellishment to the box I have been painting.  It is one of those ideas where one thing led to another.  I had purchased a workbook to learn how to do Zentangle.  It is a a great way to relax and take your mind off things.  As I started to work with the workbook, I noticed a resemblance to Moroccan art.  I was needing a small wooden box, so I decided to paint one using the skills I had picked up doing the Zentangle.   That is how things all got started.

When I was practicing with a pencil and paper, I was having trouble imitating the leaf pattern I was seeing on examples of Moroccan art.  It was not until after I started painting that I was able to get things to come out as I wanted it.  The brush stroke is basically a 45 degree line and then the tip of the paint brush is laid down from the base of the line and laid flat to get the curved shape.

Anyway, I started to paint.  I did everything freehand other than the borders.  I used a ruler to mark them and then painted them without using tape.  It gives the box a more primitive look that way.  Things aren't symmetrical.  But then, not everything in nature is evenly space either, and that was the look I was trying to produce.  I suppose that if I were to do the project again, I might mark the midpoints. 

I have done most of the painting on the top surface of the box.  I have the front floral design painted, but have not yet gone back to paint the flowers blue.  I may do some shading on all the flowers, but that will be after everything else is painted.  It is still a work in progress.

Stylized Painted Box - Part 2

In the last few days I have managed to get the base coat on the entire box and have added a few borders.  That took a lot longer than you might think.  I've also been practicing making floral patterns for the remainder of the box.  It is far from finished.  I did not start painting the floral insets yesterday because it is one of those times that is is better to have a fairly long period of uninterrupted concentration.  It may be Wednesday before I get to the point of having enough time to sit down and work on it.  I guess that my big concern is that if I have to walk away in the middle of the section that it would be noticeable because of the changes in the strokes.  If I have time to do one whole section, I think that it will come out looking better.

I painted the box with burnt umber.  It was scrubbed in with a bristle brush.  I like the way the shading of the plywood picks up darker or lighter amounts of pigment.  It reminds me of a shop that was near my home when I was growing up.  It was a Pier One import shop.  The shop was redolent of sandalwood. It was filled with exotic pieces of decorative art from far off countries.   Much of the art was made from rough dark wood with inlays of mother of pearl.  At the time it seemed so different from anything I knew.  I'm attempting to recreate those patterns in this box.

By the next time I post I hope to have at least the top panel painted.  I already have some of the lines drawn on the box with a soft pencil.  I'm not really sure how well they will be followed at this point.  I'm not quite satisfied with the design.  I know what I want, I'm just not quite sure how to get there.  Time will tell.

Stylized Painted Box

Last blog post I had written that I wanted to add more pattern and texture to my art work.  I had been working with a Zentangle workbook.  I am really excited to be working with something new.  And of course, I can hardly wait to try to adapt it to my own style.  I like to learn a new method and then see where I can go with it.  For my first project I decided to do a painted wooden box.  I actually needed a small wooden box for keeping a few items.  It seemed like it would be fun to paint the box rather than purchase an already decorated box.  It would give me a chance to put my new skills to work.  Once again I am working on a small project.  This box is 9 inches wide by 6 inches deep by 3.5 inches high. 

I was so excited to get to work on this project that I started painting on it before I took the time to
remove the hardware from the box.  Since I took these photos, I have removed the hardware so that I can paint the rest of the box.  I started with a medallion and added a lotus floral motif.  I made the medallion them by using a compass rather than use somebody's pattern.  I removed the metal corners on the bottom of the box because I thought that in the long run that it would scratch my furniture.  I plan to add felt to the bottom of the box.  At the moment, the top corners are still on the box.  The box is not very expensive and the pieces are flimsy.  They are also nailed in place.  I'm concerned that by removing them they won't be able to be put back in place.  Sometimes it is just better to leave things as they are.  If I damage them while removing them they may not go back in place
well.

I also painted some borders around the floral motif.  I marked them with a ruler and then hand painted them without using any tape.  The lines are not as straight as if I used tape.  I want this box to have a very antique painted look to it.  Straight lines have there place, but sometimes they make things look overly ordered rather than hand painted.  That is about as far as I have gone with that project.

I thought I'd show a page of my work in the Zentangle workbook.  The top two items and the right hand item on the second row (Labeled numbers one, two, and three) are my copies of the Zentangle workbook projects.  The second row left and bottom experiments (Numbered four and five) are me adapting it to my own ideas.

More on the painted box on Sunday.

Glass Mosaic Gazing Ball - Part 7 - Embellishment

Grouted gazing ball.

In my last post on the gazing ball project I showed that the ball had been grouted.  Technically, other than giving the gazing ball a coat of exterior grade sealer, the ball is complete.  Since I used the grout with resin in it, the grout is already highly waterproofed.  I still use a sealer.  If you are going to take the time to make a gazing ball, you might as well make it so that it is going to last a long time.  However, there are still more options that you can use to change the appearance of the ball.  One of them is paint.  And how you decide to paint the ball can make a big difference in its overall appearance.

Grout painted to create horizontal bands.

You can paint the gazing ball so that it appears to have solid stripes, or add a contrasting color between  the tesserae and have stripes of a different color between each band of color.  Another option would be to paint the grout to match the ball so that the gazing ball appears to be solid.  You could add dots of color on top of the painted grout.  There are plenty of ways to change the appearance of the gazing ball.  I am showing a couple of options on this ball so you can get the idea.  After that, let your imagination take off.

Gold metallic paint added to separate bands of turquoise.

When I laid out the tesserae on the gazing ball I used a pattern that would accentuate horizontal bands of tiles and horizontal grout lines.  I first painted the grout lines between the horizontal bands of glass tiles.  The paint is not an exact match.  It is about a shade lighter than the tesserae, but when you are standing a few feet back from it, the band reads as a solid.  The lighter horizontal grout lines separate the bands of color.  At this point, I could paint those horizontal lines the same color and the gazing ball would appear to be a solid color.  If it was outside in sunlight, the light would be reflecting off the glass tiles, giving the ball a glow.

In this case, I decided I wanted to paint the rest of the lines with a metallic gold paint.  The metallic paint would reflect more light than the flat acrylic paint.  It also gives the ball the a much different look from the plain gray grout.  The gray color tends to recede.  Painting the bands a bright gold makes the lines appear to move forward. 

The painting of the ball is complete other than the sealer.  Since it was a sunny day, I wanted to take some pictures outside so that you would have an idea of what it looked like in sunlight.  Since it is still winter and the temperatures are below freezing, the ball will come back inside until warmer weather.  If rain soaks in through cracks in the grout or where the grout meets the glass, water can freeze and cause cracks in the gazing ball.

Polished metal gazing balls are so popular because the surface can reflect so much light. The grout on a mosaic gazing ball does not reflect light except where it bounces off or through pieces of glass.  I decided to use a high gloss exterior sealer to seal the gazing ball.  I want as much shine coming off the ball as possible.  The high gloss sealer will reflect more light than a matte or satin sealer.  I am only painting the grout and the edges of the tiles with sealer.  The flat front of the glass tiles will not be sealed.  They are highly polished and I don't want to cover that reflective surface.  I have already put on one coat of the sealer.  Once the second coat of sealer is on, the project will be complete.

Check back on the Sunday post for a new project.

Glass Mosaic Gazing Ball - Part 6- Grout

I have completed grouting the gazing ball.  I used a sanded grout.  If you look at the top of the ball, you can see that the grout is a little darker than the grout beneath.  I had to make a repair in that area.  The grout did not stay in that area very well when I turned the ball over to grout the underside.  A little of it came out and had to be filled in again once the rest of the ball was dry.  It will soon dry to to same color as the rest of the grout.

This repair brings up an issue that can be used as a helpful hint.  When you purchase a bag of grout, the
inclination is to dump the whole bag in and add your liquid then mix it up as per the directions on the bag of grout.  I generally hold back a small amount of the grout for a couple of reasons.  The first reason is that if you have added too much liquid to begin with, you have no grout left to help thicken the mixture.  I have had that happen more than once.  Having a little grout mix in reserve can save the day.  If you had to make a trip to the hardware store for more grout, your grout may have set up and could be unusable by the time you return. 

The second reason is that you may need to make a repair and if you have no grout left, then you will need to go purchase more grout.  In the case of this sphere, the grout crumbled out of the bottom and needed to be patched.  Another common scenario with mosaics is that a tesserae will come loose from its adhesive and come off when you wipe down the ball after grouting it.  In that case, you will need to clear out the area, re-glue the piece, and grout around it again.  If your grout has already set up before you find it, it is nice to have a little reserve grout around to mix up for a small repair.

When I mentioned mixing the grout with liquid above, I used the word liquid rather than water.  When you are purchasing your grout, make sure to read the directions.  Some grout works by just adding water.  Other grout only works if you add a liquid acrylic ad-mix.  If you add water to that, you are going nowhere fast.  Generally, you can add some acrylic ad-mix to the grout that calls for water.  Why use an acrylic ad-mix if you can use only water?  Because is will help prevent water from penetrating the grout.  The ad-mix essentially encases the grout mix in a plastic waterproof substance.  It could help your ball last longer.  Using the acrylic ad-mix will add to the expense of the ball.  Generally you have to purchase it in a gallon or five gallon size.  Once in a while you can find a half-gallon of it in a home improvement store on online.  You are more likely to find the smaller size online.  The current trend is to only offer the larger sizes in the stores. 

 For this gazing ball I used a light gray grout.  You have a few other choices, at most hardware stores you can purchase grout colors in white, gray, black, almond, and a few variations in the shade of those colors.  A little experimenting on paper before hand can help you with your grout choice.  The choice of grout color and help blend the mosaic together or separate the tesserae so that the lines becomes the most important visual aspect. You can find powdered additives that you can add to the grout when you mix it in order to have different colors.  Most of the time you will have to order and purchase the powdered additives online.  The colored additives are not found at all hardware stores.

You can also use paint on your mosaic gazing ball.  I have read that you can add liquid craft paint at the time the grout is mixed to obtain a desired color.  I have not personally tried this.  My experience with adding paint to another substance (a clay made out of drier lint) was that I had to add a lot more paint than I thought to make it the color I wanted.  It turned out to be much more expensive to add paint to the material than it would have been to have just painted the object the color I desired once the material had dried.  And if you end up not having enough paint to make the grout your desired color, you either have to settle for an unacceptable color or start all over again because more than likely the grout you have mixed will be unusable when you return from purchasing more paint.

Another thing I have learned about grout color is that bright white grout shows a lot of dirt; much more so than a gray grout.   As the gazing ball will be outdoors spring through late fall, it tends to collect a fair amount of dirt and grime.  The dirt against bright white will be very noticeable against the white.

I intend to embellish the gazing ball by painting the grout lines.  I have already started painting, but have not completed it yet.  You will see the embellished gazing ball on my Thursday blog post.  I think you will be surprised at how much painting the grout will change the look of the ball. 

Winter Scene Painting

I did not have time to grout the gazing ball as I had hoped.  More on that in a minute.  Since I did not have a lot of time to spend on things I worked on a painting.  Regular readers might recall that the last time I posted a photo of a picture that I had painted it was only my fifth painting ever.  It is one of those Catch 22 situations.  I don't paint very often, and when I do the painting isn't very good.  Since my painting is not very good, I feel discouraged and don't paint.  (It would also help if I could draw, but that is another story.)  Anyway, the only cure for bad paintings are to paint until you get better at it.  So this is painting number six.

This painting is what I think is called a memory painting.  It is a picture of the road that goes by my cabin.  I have not been there on a snowy day in a long time.  I did not paint from a photo of it.  It is just a picture of the road where it goes over the stream and up around the bend.  It does not actually look much like it.  Needless to say, there are a lot more trees up there than I put in the painting.  At this point I wish I had put in more background trees.  Oh well, next painting.  It still has that folk art feel to it, but I think things are improving.

I did not grout the gazing ball because I had a lot of other things that needed to my attention.  I hate to take on a project like that when I am feeling rushed.  I was also still a bit annoyed with my shopping experience for grout.   It was a frustrating day. I went to the hardware store that focuses more on home improvement projects because they carry smaller size bags of grout.  They have the size I need, and it was only $3.28.  But, that grout size says on the front that it is Part C of a grout product.  It says that it must be mixed with Part AB, and that you cannot use water.  There is no Part AB on the shelves.  After a futile search, I finally track down a store employee that says that there is no more Part AB and that they are no longer allowed to sell such small lots of grout.  I suspect that I know what Part AB is, and think that I might be able to use a mortar ad mix, but I can't say for certain.  I give up on that product because I don't know for sure that it will work, and I don't want to make a mess of my project if it does not work.  I had to purchase a bag of grout for $10.98 cents.  It is a lot more grout than I need, but what are you going to do?  I guess I'll be throwing out some grout.

I had to run some more errands, and that took me over by the hardware store that is geared towards builders and contractors.  I decided to stop by and check out their grout selections hoping that I could find a size that would save some money.  If I could save some money, I planned to return the other product.  Well, this store now stocks some grout in small containers.  However, the containers were so small that I would have to purchase two of them to make sure that I had enough grout to complete the project.  The containers cost $5.98 each.  That made it more expensive to purchase the two small containers than it did the large one.  So, it cost more to not throw away the extra grout.  I stuck with my original purchase.  The extra stop at the second hardware store made me feel that I would be rushing to get the project done if I started at that time. 

Hopefully, I will have the ball grouted this afternoon.  It is turning out to be one of those days that I call, "But wait there's more."  I have been trying to get to the point of grouting the ball since 8:30 am.  There is so much that needs to be done before I can get to working on the grout.  If not tomorrow, it will definitely be Friday.  Check back for photos of the gazing ball on the Sunday blog post.

Glass Mosaic Gazing Ball - Part 4

Ready for grouting

.

This week I completed adding the glass tesserae to the sphere.  All that is left is for it to be grouted.  I'll have to make another trip to the hardware store.  I guess some readers wonder why I did not buy the grout when I went to the hardware store for waterproof foil tape and silicone adhesive.  A legitimate question, and in this case I have a reasonable answer.  I live just about equally distant from two big name hardware stores.  One is more focused on the home improvement sector while the other markets to builders and contractors.  They don't always carry the same products; and if they do have the same products, the products come in different sizes from one store to the other.   One store did not carry the waterproof tape, so I ended up at the other store, which had the tape and silicone.  It had the type of grout I wanted but in huge contractor size units.  It was not going to be cost effective to purchase such a large bag because it was considerably more grout than I needed.  Once you open those bags, moisture and humidity can cause the material to harden over time.  So the material needs to be used in a relatively short period of time.  It was more cost effective to make a trip over to the other store to purchase grout in a smaller size.  Of course, you are paying more per unit of weight for the smaller size bag, but for this project it is still enough of a savings to make it worthwhile. 

I decided to set the tiles at about a quarter inch apart in order to accentuate the grout lines going
around the ball.  Using a wider grout area also used less of the glass, which helps keep the cost of the sphere down.  It will of course cost more in grout, but because this is a more expensive type of glass, using more grout is cost effective. 

Using a wider grout line also helps to anchor the tesserae and make the glass more secure on the sphere.  The grout needs to set up around each piece of glass and secure it in place.  If the glass is not entirely surrounded, or did not receive enough adhesive, a tesserae could become dislodged during the cleaning process that occurs after grouting.  If a piece comes loose, you have to chisel out the grout, reapply the silicone adhesive and tile, allow that to dry, and then re-grout the disturbed area.  It is a bit of work, and a real annoyance when you think you are just finishing up a project and find out that you have to make a repair.   By making sure that you leave at least an eighth of an inch between each tesserae you can save yourself some work.

Another reason for the wider grout line is that the grout lines can be used to be part of the pattern of the gazing ball.  A closer grout line would make the ball look more like solid glass.  By having wider grout lines, the line themselves form a visual pattern.  In this case it will be lines circling around the sphere horizontally.  The glass I am using has lines cut into the glass.  I have laid the tiles so that all the line are horizontal also.  This should give the appearance of directional movement to the gazing ball.  At this point, it is not easy to see, but once the grout is in place, it should be more noticeable.

Today it is pouring down rain.  Earlier this week we had an ice storm.  Tomorrow should be nice, and I hope to get to the hardware store.  I expect to have the ball grouted by Thursday.

Next blog post I will be writing about how the choice of grout color can affect the look of the ball and about grout additives.