Still Inspired By My Garden's Lilies

In my 53 years as an artist this is the very first time I've tried painting lilies in gouache. All I can say I that I can't imagine why I waited so long. The paint just glides on and mixes so easily that It's by far one of my favorite types of paints so far.

 Instead of starting with a canvas and just painting the flower like the photo I thought I'd design a dala horse with them instead which gives me a project for my dala horse blog and a new design for merchandise in my dala horse store on  zazzle.

The main benefit of working in this way is that it gives my subscribers a new project to try or read about and it gives my customers on zazzle another fun design to use on things.

Even better than that is not cluttering up my house with a bunch of unsold, unwanted paintings that will end up in a dumpster when I'm gone.

At least for myself I feel that I've found the perfect balance in life.

Here's what the project page looked like when I finished it but instead of just letting it sit in my sketchbook I decided to put it to work and see what else I could do with it.

I started by cutting the images apart.

Next I cut each of the images out.

And then the fun began as I mounted them on cards and added more drawing to them.

I used markers to draw leaves where I was going to attach the photo and a few more where I attached the horse to pull the whole design together.

Here's the envelope I made for it.

...and the 2 of them together.

You may remember this small gouache painting that I did recently on a watercolor card. well, as a bit of a joke to a friend I wrote this on the inside of the card:
"Poor horsey, lost between art and craft"

It struck me funny because I'd been showing my paintings in various art shows and public buildings for for many years but after I designed a painted chair for a national magazine about 20 years ago I found "I'd fallen through the cracks" as the old saying goes. The galleries didn't want me because I was a "crafter" and the craft people didn't want me because they said "she's too artistic".

This mean't several years in poverty and obscurity until I decided that I don't care what people call me or my work, I just need to keep creating things.

Other envelope designs for the project.

I couldn't resist adding a lily to this old painting too.

Here's a card I made with a photo of the painting. Drawings were added to it and the envelope with markers.

I've been happier, been able to make almost anything I've needed to use, wear or barter with for other things I wanted.

Now, my childhood dream of seeing my designs in peoples homes around the world has come true as I've been working with zazzle for the last few years putting my paintings an drawings on any sort of product you imagine. I'm still not making much money but I really love what I do and hope that someday it will actually begin to put food on the table and pay my bills. In the meantime it's fun to check and see what part of the world bought something and loves my designs.