I much prefer painting over a background so the whole board was given a generous coat of Crawford and Black’s Studio Red, mixed with Windsor and Newton Gum Arabic to keep its sheen with a wide soft brush. Once dry, I used a thin coat of magenta acrylic glitter paint that I found in The Works, followed by another coat of the white glitter (nobody is ever too old to play with glitter). Crawford and Black acrylic paint is a fantastic range, especially as it’s priced in the low end of the market (£2 for a 200ml tube). It’s thick enough to use with a pallet knife but blends and mixes really well too. A bargain in anybody’s book.
The texture paste (Daler Rowney) was applied with a narrow pallet knife and then scraped back to create the ripples on the petal edges, the center, and the stem to give it some body. I love playing with this stuff. If you haven’t had a go with it before, I recommend that you give it a try.
I’ve used a limited pallet for the flower head as my focus was on using light and shade to create depth.
- (System 3) Mars Black, Crimson, Cadmium Red (hue)
- (Galleria) Lemon Yellow, Phthalo Green
- (Crawford and Black) Titanium White
Just as a side note to the reader, I don’t really rate the System 3’s (from Daler Rowney) anymore as they seem to be a great deal thinner than they used to be when I took my art GCSE (way back in ’97), but I still have some small tubes left from the last batch I bought and it does okay for blending and small areas. Galleria from Windsor and Newton are better if you want something really thick but can work out expensive if you, like me, prefer a larger canvas to work on.
Inspired by this photo
