Posts Tagged ‘more cowbell’
Blood Moon 5
Tuesday, May 6th, 2014
Blood Moon 5 by Amy Crook
Another Blood Moon made its way into my work queue this month, this time by adding some very subtle tentacles to an older painting in lieu of the previous image. This one is much more eerie than the last one, the bloody color leeching from the shadow to the white parts of the moon, and a second, smaller moon waiting off to one side, ruddy and strange. This sky is not our sky, or perhaps it is our sky many millennia hence, when the stars have become right and Great Cthulhu will rise up from R’lyeh to reclaim the planet for himself.
Blood Moon 5, 5″x7″ Japanese watercolor on Arches cover black paper.
Blood Moon 5, detail, by Amy Crook
Above, you can more clearly see the subtle mist and dark black tentacles rising up from the bottom of the painting, reaching toward the bloody moons. Below, the piece rests in a frame, a little window to some awful future*, or perhaps somewhere very far away indeed.
Blood Moon 5, framed art by Amy Crook
*Perhaps it’s Thundarr the Barbarian’s future, instead of Cthulhu’s. I always did like Ookla.
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Floating Gallery, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes, Tentacles
Tags: black paper, blood moon, for sale, japanese watercolor, moon, more cowbell, tentacles, watercolor
Deepest R’lyeh
Saturday, March 8th, 2014
Deepest R’lyeh, abstract art by Amy Crook
“Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn”
(“In his house at R’lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.”)-HP Lovecraft
Strange, tentacled things grow in the depths, with the horrible spheres of the ancient city of R’lyeh shining dim and strange through the murky waters. Colors shift and change, and objects seem to flow into one another in ways that the mind can’t quite comprehend. What strange horrors lie just out of sight, waiting for the stars to be right?
Deepest R’lyeh, 5″x5″ watercolor and duochrome watercolor on Arches cover white paper.
Deepest R’lyeh, detail, by Amy Crook
Above, you can see a close-up of one of the strange, multicolored tentacle creatures. Below, you can see the piece in a frame, a window into a world of madness.
Deepest R’lyeh, framed art by Amy Crook
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Floating Gallery, Sea Creatures and Other Animals, Series and Books, Tentacles
Tags: duochrome, for sale, iridescent, more cowbell, watercolor
Descent
Sunday, February 2nd, 2014
Descent, abstract art by Amy Crook
A violet night sky is peppered with the texture of stars. Shimmering halos surround these rocky meteors as they descend through that peaceful sky, trailing glittering fire behind them. There’s red and green and lavender and some hints of blue and brown and gold. The sunlight changes everything, and a closer look shows shining crystals jutting up off the page, intruding into the third dimension.
This painting took a lot of fits and starts and several different forms before I was happy with this final work. All of the pieces work in harmony to tell a visual story, instead of fighting to find meaning between them.
Descent, 7″x5″ salt, watercolor, and duochrome watercolor on paper.
Descent, detail, by Amy Crook
Above, you can see a close-up of some of the meteors, see the rich red and shimmery green, and the lavender halos lighting up against the violet sky. Below, you can see the painting all tucked into a frame, protected from the elements and ready to grace your wall, desk, or shelf.
Descent, framed art by Amy Crook
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Floating Gallery
Tags: duochrome, for sale, more cowbell, purple, salt, violet, watercolor
Five for Silver
Tuesday, December 3rd, 2013
Five for Silver, watercolor by Amy Crook
Tuesday seems like a good day for some crows flying through the gloaming. The moon has risen early, gibbous and pale above the evergreens. Soft clouds curl and five black birds fade ghostlike into the shimmering twilight sky.
This is a mix of very different paints that all fall under “watercolor,” with the trees done in pine-scented Christmas paint, the sky textured layers of shimmering Iridescent Moonstone, the moon made of opaque Japanese watercolor, and the birds a translucent black.
Five for Silver, 8″x4″ watercolor on Fluid watercolor paper.
Five for Silver, detail, by Amy Crook
Above, you can see some of the delicate shimmer on the sky, and the painterly brush strokes in the trees and birds. Below, I have it temporarily matted into a frame so you can get a feel for the unusual size.
Five for Silver, framed art by Amy Crook
Categories: Floating Gallery, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes, Sea Creatures and Other Animals, Series and Books
Tags: crow, horizons, iridescent, moon, more cowbell, nfs, sold, tree, watercolor
Cthonian Skies
Monday, December 2nd, 2013
Cthonian Skies by Amy Crook
The Floating Gallery has touched down for December, and I thought I’d start your Monday off strangely.
The swampy greens in this strange sky are laced with shimmering iridescence. The moon shimmers darkly beneath spirals of gold, and strange salt-formation stars radiate yet more gold into the gloomy mists of night. Perhaps this is what Cthulhu saw in his native skies, or what he sees now in the slice of reality he occupies as he slumbers deep beneath the waves — beautiful, maddening dreams of a night that never was.
Cthonian Skies, 5.5″x8.5″ pen & ink, salt, watercolor, and iridescent watercolor on acid-free embossed paper.
Cthonian Skies, detail, by Amy Crook
Above, you can see the sunlight making long shadows from the salt crystal stars, and the textures of paper and paint interacting. Below, it’s loosely attached to a frame for size. The final product will be properly matted and framed for shipping, to protect the nifty salty bits.
Cthonian Skies, framed art by Amy Crook
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Floating Gallery, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes
Tags: for sale, gold, green, iridescent watercolor, lovecraft, moon, more cowbell, pen and ink, salt, spirals, watercolor
Pollen
Monday, November 4th, 2013
Pollen by Amy Crook
Continuing with my new tradition of reworking old art, this piece has very little resemblance to its forebear. The soft black paper is entirely covered in a dark, velvety red like old blood, and each little salt pool has a halo of iridescent garnet. The salt pools, originally a dull pink from the Himalaya sea salt, have been dyed a bright shimmering blue to match the tentacles. They reminded me of glowing motes of pollen drifting on the breeze, which is how I got the name.
I’ve got to admit, I really hope I don’t ever have to inhale these alien grains of pollen. I’d hate to see what kind of allergy attack they’d produce — or find blue tentacles growing in my brain.
Pollen, 5″x5″ salt and watercolor on Arches cover black paper.
Pollen, detail, by Amy Crook
The big central crystal in this formation refused to be dyed blue, so it’s the only bit of the original pink left in the piece. Above, you can see the shimmering iridescent paint fading into the deeper background color — a natural-mineral paint called, appropriately, bloodstone. Below, the piece has been tucked into a frame with some extra tentacles to make it feel at home.
Pollen, framed art by Amy Crook
Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Floating Gallery, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes, Tentacles
Tags: black paper, for sale, iridescent, more cowbell, salt, tentacles, watercolor
Brass Gates to Midnight 2
Saturday, October 5th, 2013
Brass Gates to Midnight 2 by Amy Crook
Last year I painted Brass Gates to Midnight, and posted it to the blog even though it never quite felt finished to me. I decided to pull out the old piece and rework it. I spent several hours with my brown and gold paint adding depth and weight to the gates, turning the spirals from insubstantial mist to thick vines frozen in a riot of growth. I added a sheen of starlight on the dark trees, and even gave the tiny fairy tucked in the gates a bit more detail and color.
The inner spaces of the gate remain black, blocking our sight to the lands we can see through the gap and over the top. Are you tempted to push them fully open and wander into the starlit places beyond?
Brass Gates to Midnight 2, 5″x5″ Japanese and iridescent watercolor on Arches cover black paper.
Brass Gates to Midnight 2, detail, by Amy Crook
Above, you can see the little brown-and-green fairy hiding in among the brass curls of the gate. Is he luring you in, or warning you away? Perhaps it’s a bit of both.
Below, you can see the piece in a frame, like a window onto another set of possibilities.
Brass Gates to Midnight 2, framed art by Amy Crook
Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes, People, Figures and Faces, Whimsical and Strange
Tags: black paper, fairy, for sale, iridescent, japanese watercolor, metallic, more cowbell, spiral, spirals, stars, watercolor
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