Midnight Rain
Posted on October 7th, 2011
Midnight Rain by Amy Crook
This is a cool echo of the fiery copper from yesterday’s art. Although this is the same paint I used in Jellyfish Bloom, the bright aqua pigment sinks into the black paper, leaving a watery echo of peacock-iridescent shimmer floating on top.
The salt this time picked up some of the green from the pen I used, but it’s quite pale inside the opaque matrix of the crystals. They’re darker where the paint coats them, but everything about this piece came out subtle and ghostly. Appropriate for Halloween, I think.
Midnight Rain, 5″x5″ mixed media on paper.
Midnight Rain, detail, by Amy Crook
When the sunlight hits this one, the iridescent paint goes purple on the paper in lovely contrast to the rich teal you see where it coats the salt crystals. From another angle, it looks more blue, as you can see below in the framed photo.
Midnight Rain, framed, by Amy Crook
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, Series and Books
Tags: black, for sale, iridescent, pen and ink, salt, teal, watercolor
Copper Midnight
Posted on October 6th, 2011
Copper Midnight by Amy Crook, $323
This is the first of a pair of pieces I made together using Arches Cover Black paper. I love that this velvety black paper is fade-proof, because it’s not dyed but instead turns black from a chemical reaction set off in the paper. It’s art with science! Not my science, but still.
I made salt circles with my trusty orange pen, which barely picked up at all into the opaque white crystals this time. Then I used metallic copper watercolor for the ripples around each little pool, and copper gel pen for the signature, making an eerie monochrome piece very appropriate for the Halloween season.
Copper Midnight, 5″x5″ mixed media on paper, $323, framed, with free shipping.
Below you can see how the iridescent paint catches the light and glows with shimmery copper.
Copper Midnight, detail 1, by Amy Crook
Here you can see just one salt pool, with the copper coating the salt on one side and making it look like it’s almost made of some strange metallic crystal instead of mundane salt. I’ve always liked how each little ring of salt is its own tiny henge of sorts, big crystals rising up around the scattered few in the center.
Copper Midnight, detail 2, by Amy Crook
When the sunlight isn’t hitting them, the places where the paint was thinnest almost sink completely back into the black paper like ghosts, though it seems to float above the paper where it’s thickest. You can see it in its frame, below, with my iPhone for scale.
Copper Midnight, framed, by Amy Crook, $323
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, Series and Books
Tags: black, copper, for sale, iridescent, pen and ink, salt, watercolor
Tentacle Deeps 17
Posted on October 4th, 2011
Tentacle Deeps 17 by Amy Crook
Yet more tentacles for Tuesday! I used a pure wash of zoisite watercolor, and its granular quality dried in a rather squamous, scale-like texture, subtle and matte with a quality to the paint almost like pastel. The dusty paint mixed in with the pure Sharpie ink of the tentacles, softening the sharp blacks, but I wanted a bit more so I took a grey brush pen and added in a second layer of tentacles behind the first.
Tentacle Deeps 17, 5″x7″ mixed media on paper.
I have to admit, I think every single one of these looks cool photographed from this angle. Plus, you can really see the texture of the paint and paper, here.
Tentacle Deeps 17, detail, by Amy Crook
I always like how they look like they’re rising up from some other dimension held within the frame, too. What can I say, I’m easily pleased by tentacles.
Tentacle Deeps 17, framed, by Amy Crook
Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Series and Books, Tentacles
Tags: for sale, green, pen and ink, sharpie, squamous, tentacle deeps, watercolor
Sunset Postcard
Posted on October 3rd, 2011
Sunset Postcard by Amy Crook, $222
This watercolor is actually from five years ago. It managed to escape the general posting of old art last year, but I decided to frame and scan it when I ran across it the other day when I was framing some other art.
When I was younger I swear I must have painted dozens of sunsets, usually with skeletal winter trees in front, the black branches framed by colored light. I don’t have many of those left, so this one is very nostalgic for me. My favorite part is along the line of the sun itself, where some of the red has bled onto the sun the way sometimes the sky seems to waver around the edges as the sun sinks below the horizon.
Sunset Postcard, approx. 6″x4″ watercolor on handmade postcard, $222, framed, with free shipping.
I floated the postcard on a black mat within a larger frame, which makes the vivid sunset colors glow out from the darkness.
Sunset Postcard, framed watercolor by Amy Crook, $222
Categories: Daily Art, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes
Tags: for sale, handmade postcard, watercolor
Watson sketch
Posted on October 1st, 2011
Watson pen sketch by Amy Crook
Just a little pen-and-ink portrait — I’m practicing a few things about observation and not being able to erase. I did a little tiny bit of tinkering in Photoshop, I will admit, but in the end it only sort of looks like the character. Which, really, given that I’ve got little practice doing portraits or working in pen-and-ink, is pretty much okay.
Maybe the next one will be more awesome.
Categories: Daily Art, People, Figures and Faces, Things I'm a Fan Of
Tags: nfs, pen and ink, sherlock, sketch, watson
2 Comments »
Scribble Goth
Posted on September 30th, 2011
Ditzy Bones fabric print by Amy Crook
Friday is for fabric! At least this one is. I’ve created a line of fabrics over at Spoonflower called Scribble Goth, made up of scribbly skulls, spikey stripes and even one lone ditzy print of teeny tiny bones.
I haven’t made all of these designs available for purchase yet, because there’s a small but significant cost associated with doing so (it adds up!). If you’d like to buy one of these fabrics for your own projects, just let me know (comment here! contact there! email! twitter! whatever works for you, really) and I’ll buy a swatch for myself so you can get sewing. I’m even willing to make other colorways, if you’d like a blood red skirt or some Halloween orange pajamas.
Scribble Goth Skull Border fabric design in two colorways by Amy Crook
I’ve also made a version of the above border that’s got the rest of the fabric covered in the polka dots below.
Scribble Goth Skully Polka Dot fabric design in two colorways by Amy Crook
I’ve got a trio of stripes using the spikey cross from the border, though I only put two of them in the post.
Scribble Goth Cross Stripe 1 in two colorways by Amy Crook
Scribble Goth Cross Stripe 2 in two colorways by Amy Crook
And my favorite of all the patterns, a different sort of polka dot with the skulls arranged in florets.
Scribble Goth Skull Florets fabric design in two colorways by Amy Crook
Categories: Daily Art, Zombies, Skulls, and Other Morbid Things
Tags: bones, cross, fabric, goth, pen and ink, skull, spoonflower
2 Comments »
A Murder of Crows
Posted on September 29th, 2011
A Murder of Crows by Amy Crook
This piece uses several different techniques together but really just one pen, although I did go back in and add just a hint of color to the shadowy, sunlit crows in their flight. I’m very pleased with the overall effect, which makes me think of a cover or title page to some mystery novel or horror story. There’s even 13 crows in my murder to make it extra spooky.
A Murder of Crows, 6″x6″ pen & ink and salt on watercolor paper.
I like the way the salt is nearly invisible until the sunlight hits it, adding sparkle and color to an otherwise monochrome image.
A Murder of Crows, detail 1, by Amy Crook
The curving edges on each bird were partially created by the puddles of inky salt water, an imprecise process at best, which helps to give them a sense of being backed and blurred by strong sunlight.
A Murder of Crows, detail 2, by Amy Crook
Categories: Daily Art, Sea Creatures and Other Animals, Whimsical and Strange
Tags: brush and ink, calligraphy, crow, for sale, murder of crows, pen and ink, salt
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