Posts Tagged ‘tentacle deeps’

Tentacle Deeps 22

Tuesday, December 20th, 2011

Tentacle Deeps 22 watercolor by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 22 by Amy Crook

Some cheerful Christmas red tentacles for the Tuesday before! Well, all right, the shade’s a bit more bloody than Santa usually likes, but I’m not going to be the one to tell Cthulhu that.

I went with a very simple, stylized pattern on the tentacles this time, which makes them look a bit like monster fingers, creepy scratch marks, or perhaps long, wavy hair. The surface of the tentacles is subtly textured from the granulating Lunar Black watercolor, too, and it’s even more obvious in person.

Tentacle Deeps 22, 4″x8″ watercolor on paper.

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Series and Books, Tentacles
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Tentacle Deeps 21

Tuesday, December 6th, 2011

Tentacle Deeps 21 by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 21 by Amy Crook

The purple tentacles reach up through a grey sky, trying to capture the stars and align them to their whim. And now Tentacle Deeps is old enough to drink! Happy Tentacle Tuesday, indeed.

Tentacle Deeps 21, 8″x8″ watercolor on watercolor paper.

I’m not feeling well so, no framed photo, but the simple black wall frame I’ve got for it will look great.

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Series and Books, Tentacles
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Tentacle Deeps 20

Tuesday, November 29th, 2011

Tentacle Deeps 20, watercolor by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 20 by Amy Crook

Usually for these I paint the background and then put in the tentacles, but this time I decided to go about it the other way. The watercolor wash didn’t disturb the Sharpie in the foreground at all, though it did give the tentacles a distinct red tint. It did soften the grey pen-and-ink tentacles in the background so they look a bit more surreal.

I still need to properly frame this one because of the odd size, but rest assured, like all of the Tentacle Deeps series, this painting will ship framed to its future home.

Tentacle Deeps 20, 4″x8″ mixed media on paper.

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Series and Books, Tentacles
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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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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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Tentacle Deeps 17

Tuesday, October 4th, 2011

Tentacle Deeps 17, art by Amy Crook

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

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 art by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 17, framed, by Amy Crook

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Series and Books, Tentacles
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Tentacle Deeps 16

Tuesday, September 27th, 2011

Tentacle Deeps 16, art by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 16 by Amy Crook

It’s Tuesday and that means tentacles! This is painted on a handmade postcard from India, just like Tentacle Deeps 12 & Tentacle Deeps 13.

I actually use the same two colors of paint for the wash on this as yesterday’s art, but the fade is much looser, and there’s no pure pigment, just different mixtures. When I went to put the tentacles on, it struck me that I hadn’t done a horizontal one yet, and so I used the granular lunar black watercolor to paint in these tentacles. The paint settled into the groovs in the paper, emphasizing the texture of the paper and letting the background color glow through the black as though the tentacles are strangely translucent.

Tentacle Deeps 16, ~4″x6″ watercolor on handmade paper.

I can’t resist taking these bottom-up shots whenever I’m photographing these tentacle pieces these days, even though there’s no salt at all on this one.

Tentacle Deeps 16, detail, by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 16, detail, by Amy Crook

Here we are, a photo of the framed piece with my iPhone providing scale.

Tentacle Deeps 16, framed art by Amy Crook

Tentacle Deeps 16, framed, by Amy Crook

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