Wrapping up one painting, working on another

Painting by Vicky Christensen, acrylic paint and mediums on 18 X 14 inch canvas 

I'm declaring this painting finished! I added some glazed shadows then painted over a lot of the texture with Liquitex iridescent medium. So along with the glass bead gel it has some cool light reflecting qualities.

In the mean time I have been working on another small canvas. Below is a peek at the skin that will be used on that painting. I'm waiting for the medium to dry before putting everything together and keeping my fingers crossed that the painting will come together without mishaps.

Acrylic skin for work in progress 

Basking in the sun

Painting by Vicky Christensen, mixed media on 16 X 20 inch canvas 

This painting started out without a plan other than to experiment with texture. I used a painting knife to apply Golden light molding paste to the canvas then pressed various objects into it to give it some texture. Some objects worked better than others. I ended up with a circle in the upper right, so I decided to put a sun there. The rest of the painting evolved (or should I say revolved) around the sun. The painting initially had a rainbow of colors moving out from the sun, but I didn't like the intensity. The surface was too textured to use glazes to tone it down so I finally settled on the dabs of broken color to portray the sun's rays. I decided to add some flowers to the butterflies I had originally stamped into the molding paste, and decided to use Golden fiber paste for the flowers. It was fun painting the flowers since fiber paste is so absorbent. All in all, this was a fun painting.

More fun with texture

Painting by Vicky Christensen, acrylic paint and mediums on 16 X 12 inch canvas panel 

Painting by Vicky Christensen, acrylic paint and mediums on 16 X 12 inch canvas panel 

I really like adding texture to my paintings, especially when I add stenciled layers of gloss gel over an underpainting then glaze with a transparent color. I find myself wondering if I am getting repetitive but I do love the intense color and the sense of depth.

Experimenting with texture

Painting by Vicky Christensen, mixed media on 16 X 12 inch 140 lb cold press watercolor paper 

This painting is on un-gessoed watercolor paper. I wanted to see the behavior of the fluid and high flow acrylics on the un-gessoed surface. I started wet into wet, and let the paint flow. After layers of stencils I decided to experiment with glass bead gel and fiber paste. I also used stencils to apply gel medium,  which served as a resist for a glaze layer of phthalo blue. You can still see a hint of this layer in the corners.