Posts Tagged ‘for sale’

Gift Tags

Wednesday, November 9th, 2011

Holiday Gift Tags by Amy Crook

Holiday Gift Tags by Amy Crook, $9.99 a pack

A couple of people asked me about gift tags this year, so I took 5 of my favorite holiday cards and turned them into tags! They’re printed on parchment cardstock, with a hole punched for easy attaching. 15 cards in a pack, either all one thing or an assortment of 3 each, and shipping’s free.

You can pick them up at my Etsy shop during the holidays!

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Sea Creatures and Other Animals, Tentacles, Whimsical and Strange
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Tentacle Deeps 19

Tuesday, November 8th, 2011

Tentacle Deeps 19, watercolor by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 19 by Amy Crook

The background on this is a rich, pure quinacridone gold wash that glows with color like a sunset. I used a brush pen to create the tentacles, which silhouette nicely against the gold. The ink took forever to dry on the thick watercolor paint, but once it did the blackest areas look rich and matte against the slightly glossy paint.

Tentacle Deeps 18, 5″x7″ mixed media on paper.

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Series and Books, Tentacles
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Pond

Friday, November 4th, 2011

Pond, abstract art by Amy Crook

Pond by Amy Crook, $323

I decided that I wanted to go back to the original visual image that came to me with the salt pools and depict them in blue-green ink, with ripples going out, fading as they go from each pool. I imagine these like the frozen moment after the drop has hit, the ring of bigger crystasl around the edge like the splash, and each subsequent ring of paint a ripple growing fainter as it travels away from the center point. The whole piece has a very soothing, Zen-like quality to it that I quite enjoy.

Pond, 7″x5″ mixed media on paper, $323, framed, with free shipping.

The blue-green quality of this color is a bit hard to capture, the scanner wants to turn it blue and the camera wants to turn the white paper red, thus making the paint very green when the whites are corrected back.

Pond, detail, by Amy Crook

Pond, detail, by Amy Crook

Of course, like all my three-dimensional salt paintings, it ships tucked safely into a simple frame.

Pond, framed art by Amy Crook

Pond, framed, by Amy Crook, $323

Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art
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Tentacle Deeps 18

Tuesday, November 1st, 2011

Tentacle Deeps 18, mixed media art by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 18 by Amy Crook

More tentacles! I started this piece with salt that had already been gently used and had a coating of color on the outside, arranging them in a pattern that made me think of balloons floating up or perhaps fluff blowing off a dandelion. Once I got the idea to attach them to tentacles, however, I couldn’t resist! I used several shades of red and orange ink to create the tentacles, and of course my scanner hates red dyes and so a lot of the subtle gradation you can see in person is lost.

I decided to create the “deeps” part of the painting with simple crosshatching, electing to go with a fairly loose style which often ran into the tentacles, which makes them just a bit more unreal. I do wonder what the salt pools represent in this context, attached at the end of each vivid red tentacle. Egg sacs? Sensory organs? Lunch?

Tentacle Deeps 18, 7″x5″ mixed media on paper.

Tentacle Deeps 18, framed art by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 18, framed, by Amy Crook

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Series and Books, Tentacles
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Squidtini

Tuesday, October 25th, 2011

Squidtini, cartoon by Amy Crook

Squidtini by Amy Crook

My friend, G, is a big fan of both gin and squid, so one night I drew up this little guy with her in mind. He’s even made friends with the olive, which he’s got clutched in his feeder tentacles, though the gin’s given him a bit of a blush on his fins and cheeks. This little squid is sloshed!

Squidtini, 5″x7″ pen and ink and Copic markers on paper.

I think it would make a great invitation to a New Year’s dinner party, so I made cards for my Etsy shop.

Squidtini, framed art by Amy Crook

Squidtini, framed, by Amy Crook

Categories: Daily Art, Sea Creatures and Other Animals, Tentacles, Whimsical and Strange
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Radial Symmetry 2

Friday, October 21st, 2011

Radial Symmetry 2, abstract art by Amy Crook

Radial Symmetry 2 by Amy Crook, $242

This time I mixed two different colors, a deep forest green and a lighter, seafoam green. The darker green hides in the black paper somewhat, but the raised texture is more pronounced there, too, since the paint was applied in thick beads. I keep thinking there’s a name for this sort of radial pattern, especially one created with beads, but I couldn’t find it by googling.

Radial Symmetry 2, 5″x5″ mixed media on paper, $242, framed, with free shipping.

My scanner had a really hard time with the subtle colors in this piece, but you can see a better representation of both the shiny green shapes and the soft, velvety black paper.

Radial Symmetry 2, detail, by Amy Crook

Radial Symmetry 2, detail, by Amy Crook

I’ve photographed the piece in its frame with my iPhone for scale. I think this piece would look great as part of a wall grouping, along with other art, prints and photos in similar simple black frames.

Radial Symmetry 2, framed art by Amy Crook

Radial Symmetry 2, framed, by Amy Crook, $222

Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, Series and Books
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Radial Symmetry 1

Thursday, October 20th, 2011

Radial Symmetry 1, abstract art by Amy Crook

Radial Symmetry 1 by Amy Crook, $222

I got some lovely new Japanese gouache paints for my birthday, and I decided to see how they’d work on the black paper. I used double spirals inside these salt circles to give the salt more pigment, which also left darker, warmer centers where the water distributed the pigment into the paper. I used a single color of paint on this, and I found that once it dried, the color stays very consistent no matter how thickly the paint was mixed, but that the thicker paint left rounded, bead-like shapes on the paper.

I think of these a bit like beaded decorations, or possibly flowers with their warm orange centers and pale periwinkle petals. I like to imagine the piece adding a little touch of unexpected loveliness to someone’s life, tucked into a bookshelf or sitting on someone’s desk at work.

Radial Symmetry 1, 5″x5″ mixed media on paper, $222, framed, with free shipping.

Radial Symmetry 1, detail, by Amy Crook

Radial Symmetry 1, detail, by Amy Crook

The salt on these isn’t as sparkly, probably because of the matte black behind them, but I love the way the paint makes soft, glossy swells on the paper. It looks great in a simple black frame, which makes the colors really pop. You can see them reflected in my iPhone for scale, below.

Radial Symmetry 1, framed art by Amy Crook

Radial Symmetry 1, framed, by Amy Crook, $222

Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, Series and Books
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