House No. 188: Queen Anne House at Night

House No. 188: Queen Anne House at Night

colored pencil on upcycled matboard

10 in. x 10 in.

188/365; 07/07/11

Some more scavenged materials: this time a lovely piece of mat board discarded after being cut out of a larger piece to frame something. It is neatly beveled edges.

I wanted to work in reverse and create a ghostly glowing house in the moonlight, which is why I chose a high Victorian style, as they are ornate and always a bit eerie. Those Victorians were such a macabre bunch.

House No. 169: Grey Tree House

House No. 169: Grey Tree House
collage, pencil, and ink on matboard
7 in. x 6 in.
169/365; 06/18/11

Today’s house is an homage to Misha at 365 Trees. (What up, Misha? Shout out to a fellow 365er!) I have made a couple other tree houses already, and I am certain this is not my last of the year.

I started with a photo of a tree that I had clipped aeons ago and glued it to yet another piece of scavenged stock. (Again saved from my classroom’s trash.) This one was a thick piece of mat board with a lovely creamy texture. There is some vellum collaged on there as well. There are a few types of graphite and inks on the surface.

House No. 126: Achromatic Trio

House No. 126: Achromatic Trio

ink, pencil, and collage on repurposed matboard

8.75 in. x 6.5 in.
126/365; 05/06/11

The process that I used to make this piece started with a piece of vellum. It is very similar to a thick piece of tracing paper. It is actually used to diffuse light for photography, and I had a piece of it that had been damaged on a photo shoot that I was on. I had been holding on to it in my collections for awhile. 

I worked on both sides of the translucent paper before adhering to the matboard, which was another classroom salvage.

The white is correction tape that I pull out and transfer with a pencil to make varied lines. Again, I like that the process is indirect and makes me give up some control of the drawing. (This is something that I do a lot in class with my students, removing them from the direct process of mark making. It really frees up the artist to lose complete control.) The process is similar to printing and transferring.

I made the white, transferred marks with the correction tape on both sides of the vellum, and I colored with graphite to the point of going through the paper. I love how shiny the pencil gets on the smooth surface of the paper and how the marker soaks up the light almost completely, making the surface a very flat black.

The texture and quality of the surface, along with the change in tonality, indicates depth in a mostly flat drawing.

House No. 125: White on White House

 

House No. 125: White on White House

collage on matboard

8 in. x 8 in.
125/365; 05/05/11

Today's house relies on texture rather than color, line, or contrast. And it was rather difficult to photograph because of it.

The matboard that I used as a background for this house was salvaged from my classroom, and the paper and strings were also upcycled. The paper is from the same source as House No. 121: Spring Cottage. The strings were left over from the tags from House Number 71: Tagged Houses.

House No. 116: Beach House

House No. 116: Beach House
pencil, ink, white out tape, and acrylic paint on repurposed matboard
10.75 in. x 6.5 in.
116/365; 04/26/11


I found this piece of mat board on its way to the trash* in my classroom. It was almost a finished piece without my adding to it. When I looked at it, I saw a beach landscape. I just added the details to create a house from the indications of one that I already saw there.

As I tell my students, we have to see before we can create. This is a perfect example of that.

I added the graphite, the white acrylic paint, and that one white stripe on the sand.


*Honestly, some of our students don't seem to have clue as to what they are throwing away.