Posts Tagged ‘for sale’
Ever Outward
Friday, July 8th, 2011
Ever Outward, tiny oil painting by Amy Crook, $129
This is a companion piece to another little oil painting, In and In and In. After the “light at the end of the tunnel” feeling of the first painting, I wanted something that instead felt like emerging from the heart of a mystery. Most of the paint on this is iridescent, the purple and even the black in the middle, though the paint around the outside is an opaque blue-white that frames and grounds the piece.
Ever Outward, 2.75″x2.75″ oil paint on canvas with 5″ wooden easel, $129 with free shipping.
Here you can see the piece on its easel, with the shimmering paint highlighted despite the back lighting that darkens up the white frame.
Ever Outward, with easel, by Amy Crook, $129
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art
Tags: easel, for sale, oil painting, tiny painting
Goth Vines
Thursday, July 7th, 2011
Goth Vines by Amy Crook, $222
Inspired by the same sort of Tim-Burton-esque design as Saturday’s Deplorable Figurine, this piece combines the fractal salt images with pen-and-ink drawing that was later softened with a wet brush.
Despite the fact that I no longer dress up much, my Goth tastes still permeate a lot of my life, from the Living Dead Doll in her coffin atop my bookshelf to the plethora of Nightmare Before Christmas collectibles around the house. I’ve always enjoyed things that make me say, “That’s so weird!” That sensibility shows up in my work sometimes, like today’s piece, not to mention all the zombies, vampires and other such cartoons.
Goth Vines, 5″x5″ ink and salt on watercolor paper, $222, framed, with free shipping.
The now-blue spirals started out as black fountain pen ink, but the water drew out the brown-gold portion of the ink, making golden haloes around the blue-grey centers. The effect gives them an odd glow where they attach to the end of the vines, though actually the vines were drawn in later.
Goth Vines, progress, by Amy Crook
I really think this detail shot I got is gorgeous, especially at extreme closeup – click on it (or nearly any image in my posts) to see it bigger!
Goth Vines, detail, by Amy Crook
I like the way the vines seem to grow out of the narrow black frame I found for them.
Goth Vines, framed, by Amy Crook, $222
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, Whimsical and Strange
Tags: black, for sale, goth, pen and ink, salt
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Snowflakes
Tuesday, July 5th, 2011
Snowflakes by Amy Crook, $222
After seeing the lovely crystal formations in Aglow, I decided to test out what I could get with blue ink and the same paper. The effect was extremely simple but quite lovely, so I decided to keep it as is rather than muddle it up with anything else.
Snowflakes, 5″x5″ pen and ink and salt on watercolor paper, $222, framed, with free shipping.
Here’s a shot of one of the snowflakes up close.
Snowflakes, detail, by Amy Crook
It’s enhanced well by a very simple black frame.
Snowflakes, framed art by Amy Crook
I’ve put a detailed set of shot of the progress behind the cut, so you can see how the snowflakes grew.
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes
Tags: blue, for sale, pen and ink, salt
1 Comment »
Oil Slick
Monday, July 4th, 2011
Oil Slick by Amy Crook, $199
I’m constantly frustrated by how hard these pieces are to photograph. The few people who have seen them in person agree with me that there’s really no way to capture the texture, the play of light and color, and the overall feel of the sparkling salt. In this case, the salt sucked up the paint and the dark green ink spirals to acquire a dark iridescence like an oil slick or a bird’s wing.
Oil Slick, 5.5″x4.25″ mixed media on embossed card, $199 with free shipping. I’m still on the lookout for frames for these pieces, but they could be mounted in a larger frame quite easily with a simple matte.
You can see below how the salt crystals formed with layers of color, making intriguing tiny patterns within the patterns.
Oil Slick, detail 1, by Amy Crook
And here’s a hint of the way the colors shift and change when you move the piece in the light:
Oil Slick, detail 2, by Amy Crook
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art
Tags: for sale, pen and ink, salt, watercolor
Monsters of HP Lovecraft Print
Wednesday, June 29th, 2011
Monsters of HP Lovecraft Print by Amy Crook, $23.23
My 4-year-old printer finally bit the dust 2 weeks ago, and when the time came to replace it, I couldn’t resist the lure of a large-format printer. It prints my cards beautifully (and borderlessly), and now I can make something awesome and new – posters! Actually the color is richer and deeper than the old printer, so my cards look even better now, closer to the originals.
Okay, the best part is really that it just fits into the bookshelf where the old one lived, so I don’t have to try to rearrange everything. But the prints are pretty cool.
Cthulhu, Nyarlathotep, and half a dozen others are printed in rich, cartoon colors along with their names and a short description of their place in the Lovecraft Mythos.
I’ve decided to run an open edition of 11″x17″ prints, on high-quality 28-lb bright white laser paper. I’ll be shipping them first class mail in good-quality cardboard poster tubes, so you should get yours in perfect condition and ready to hang. I’ll even sign it!
Monsters of HP Lovecraft Print, 11″x17″ print on paper, $23.23 with free shipping in the US. Available at my Etsy shop.
Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art
Tags: copic marker, cthulhu, etsy, for sale, lovecraft, pen and ink, weeble
Mod Tree
Monday, June 27th, 2011
Mod Tree, framed, by Amy Crook, $222
This piece was an experiment in making something less abstract out of the salt pools. I really like the way the arrangement of dots suggest a tree without ever actually forming the shape of leaves. The circles remind me of abstract Mod art from the ’60s, hence the name.
When I make these pieces, I can only line three or four up on the bookshelf at a time, and they have to dry anywhere from half a day to a full 24 hours. I can’t always take good progress photos if I start something at night, but when the sun’s shining in the window I do try to make sure I get some shots.
Mod Tree, 5″x7″ salt, pen and ink and watercolor on watercolor paper, $222, framed, with free shipping.
In the first detail shot, the lighter colors got washed out a bit but you can see the biggest salt crystals rising up off the paper.
Mod Tree, detail 1, by Amy Crook
Here you can see how the minimalist tree trunk gently supports the sparkling arrangement of leaves above.
Mod Tree, detail 2, by Amy Crook
Here you can really see the salt inside each water droplet, before it dissolved. I love how the light just glows through the water at the start, an ephemeral moment of beauty in the process of making art.
Mod Tree, in progress, by Amy Crook
The scanned version doesn’t have the same sparkle and dimension as the photos, but you can see the shape and color really clearly. It’ll ship in its frame so it stays nice and safe on its journey to your home.
Mod Tree by Amy Crook, $222
Categories: Daily Art, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes
Tags: for sale, green, pen and ink, salt, tree, watercolor
Treasures
Friday, June 24th, 2011
Treasures by Amy Crook, $199
I only added a few minimal details to the original tea wash on this piece. I took brown pen and gave the face I saw dark eyes, so it looks like a mysterious veiled creature curled possessively around the lighter space in the center. Then I gave it something to be possessive of — I used the same brown ink to make spirals for the salt crystals to rest on, and then went through the process to make salt pools.
I took some photos of the process so you can see it below.
Treasures, 7″x5″ mixed media on paper, $199, framed, with free shipping.
First we have the dried tea wash, ink, and carefully chosen crystals of salt. There’s a lot of size variation in the bottle of coarse sea salt I bought, so I make sure to choose appropriately for the effect I want. In this case, I went for small to medium crystals so the pools would stay discrete and relatively flat.
Treasures, work in progress part 1, by Amy Crook
Second, I drop on the water with an eyedropper. The water washes the dust and scratches off the salt right away, leaving clear crystals that are hard to see, and the ink immediately starts to curl up into the water as well.
Treasures, work in progress part 2, by Amy Crook
Here the salt and ink have dissolved as much as they’re going to, making a fluid made of brown ink, salt, whatever tea dissolves back in, and of course tap water.
Treasures, work in progress part 3, by Amy Crook
And finally the water evaporates overnight, taking sometimes as much as a full day and leaving behind salt crystals imbued with the ink and tea. These crystals grow onto the paper, and so they’re quite well-attached. The tea gave the salt a very subtle bluish tint for some reason, though the brown ink really covers that up.
Treasures, work in progress part 4, by Amy Crook
I found a lovely wood frame that matches wonderfully with the warm browns of the tea wash. Below you can see the final piece in its frame, with the mysterious figure looming protectively over the 7 sparkling piles of salt.
Treasures, framed, by Amy Crook, $199
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, People, Figures and Faces
Tags: for sale, salt, tea
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