The Adventures of Goldilocks and Her Bears

I have this simple Christmas gift project: take two large and one small ceramic chess pieces and spray paint them a color that is not lime green*.

Haha, I say! With primer and a top coat, this should just take a couple of days.

Ha, ha, indeed. The first round of primer didn't adhere. Despite the claims on the can, it flaked off on my fingers after twice the recommended drying time.

I sanded it off and smoothed the few bits that actually adhered. Have I mentioned I hate sanding? I hate sanding. So now the primer should really stick! Except this go 'round it's crackling where the old and new primer meet. Gah!

I was able to fake it on the tiny one and just sand down the crackles. It's now twice painted and topcoated.

Now it's time to pick up a new brand of spray primer, sand, and see whether the third time is the charm on the big ones. *grumble*


*Seriously? What designer said, "chess pieces? Hmm, yes... I see... green: celadon... no, lime!"

I've been chewing on teaching some classes based on research I've been doing about renaissance painting techniques. What I'd like to do is a series of classes taking students through the different skills learned by a painter's apprentice. I could see the series running something like this:

Drawing:
1 - introduction to drawing basic 3 dimensional shapes; shading and perspective
2 - drawing more complex shapes; still life and landscape features, principles of light
3 - drawing the human figure

Design
4 - priciples of layout and design for the renaissance painter; Pythagorean harmonies
5 - color theory; symbology, light, warmth and coolness
6 - create the design; figural studies, color studies

Painting
7 - basics of paint and supplies; tempera, oil colors, how they're made, what they're used for, brushes, panels, canvas
7.1 - maybe how to make oil paint. Maybe not, it's often toxic and requires a lot of expensive supplies
7.2 - maybe goldwork; it's not something I really want to teach and is much less common as we get into renaissance painting
8 - preparing the ground; gesso/priming, design transfer
9 - basics of painting; brushwork, glazing, scumbling, grisaille, imprimatura, etc. I'll probably use acryllics for this. They have a lot of the same properties as oils, but dry faster and are less toxic.
10 - basics of painting; starting the background
11- working the paints; adding lights, darks, and mid-tones
12 - finishing; details, glazes

Obviously, this would take several years to go through. I could see doing some of the design classes as open groups, but the hands-on classes would have to be smaller. In theory, I could take a group of gifted students through 1-3, 4-6, or 8 & 10-12 in a day, but they'd really need a lot of practice to get comfortable between the steps, so I don't know that any one group would be comfortable going through all three/four classes that way. To run true to period practice, the students would take 8-12 twice. The first time to copy a master, the second time to paint their own design.

Also, my imagination has been tickled by vittoriosa 's idea of doing classes in persona. That might be worth exploring, too. I think it would add a nice flavor to the atelier.

Does this sound like a series that people would be interested in? I can see folks being loosely interested in the design aspects, but don't know that a lot of people are willing to put in the years of practice it will take to learn to draw and then to learn to paint after that.

We had an awesome weekend!

Saturday, moriven did super well in the tournament. I think he was #5 in the day. He beat Viscountess Brin and Herzog Matthias in super cool fights. He held his ground and kicked some donkey even with Matthias all over him with his dagger. I'm so proud :) He also had an awesome fight with Sir Conall. They looked like they were having so much fun! That makes me happy.

Sunday, we went down to the races at Laguna Seca. It was my first time going to a race. It was pretty cool - especially the Porsches. I think I grinned like an idiot for most of the day because moiven was having a good time and having my honey happy makes me happy.

ETA: He was fourth in the tournament!

( For the dozen people who I have not brought to my bed... I bring my bed to you! )

I spent today laying down the background paint on the headboard and foodboard on our camp bed. Then  I did the acanthus leaves on our new sunshade. It felt good to get back to that project.

This evening we had a tasting dinner for the feast. Yay, bunny! Branwen's boys are a hoot.

I have been informed that I need to paint my pavilion (after the bed, after the war...). Anyone have any ideas about what I should do? Period examples? Mottoes? Really cool stuff? Favorite paint?

That's it in my userpic, by the way. The dags are outlined in blue. 

My colors are blue & white, moriven's are red, black & white, tho' we're not limited to those - I dig a nice gold here and there.

This was my own personal arts and sciences weekend.  

Thursday I came home and got a wild hare up my keister, so I cut back some of the ivy that was growing through the fence into my patio. This caused the rest of the ivy to pull the fence over the other way. Apparently those bugs that we told the landlord about really were eating away the fence. I ended up cutting away a big chunk of ivy just so the whole fence would not go over. moriven came home just as I was hauling the larger chunk - maybe 6'x4'x3' - to the trash. The look on his face was priceless.

I got the next coat of paint on the side rails of the bed. I'm down to the detail work now. I had to go out to buy different paint yesterday because the latex house paint that I've been working with, while durable, dries too fast to do the blending and shading that I want. I think it will provide a nice undercoat, but the details are going to be done in acryllic. Then we're going to varnish the crap out of it. (Right, right, sure, I could do it in period paint... but I'm not really up for grinding my own pigments, thanks.) I finally decided on the design for when I paint the footboard, but I'm nowhere near starting that project. I want to finish the sides first. The headboard, well, we're still debating.

I also got a ton of necklaces made. And photographed! And posted on smugmug! Tusya, I'll have some of these for your next auction. I need to find a good time to give them to you. Some will go the the Esfenn raffle, too (more about that in a later post). 

Last night I finished another big piece in the massive embroidery undertaking. I am pleased.