inspiration | Charlotte Engel Studio

Step by step – 100 artworks part 3

I strongly believe in inspiration. I wouldn’t be where I am artisticly or personally if I hadn’t had access to inspiration. For this piece I (almost) followed the steps in this video series from Laura Lein-Svencner. Well, up to a point. Then my own process totally took over and things evovled…

First, a few magazine clippings and a bit of patterned paper was glued down with gel medium step1

Pale green acylic paint was rolled on with a brayer to push the collage papers back The white paint was sprayed out of an almost empty paint bottle, something I love to do even though it’s pretty hard to control step2

Shadows added with a bit of burnt umber

Then some scribbles and marks using Neocolor I crayons I have no idea what characters will emerge from this yet step4

Next step was to stamp with some homemade stamps. Stamps can be made in a lot of materials. Mine are linocut Now a human figure is beginning to show step5

Another layer of acrylic paint. This time I scribbled with a scewer into the wet paint

And this is where I lost myself. The characters took over and one thing led to another = no documentation of the last steps But this is how it turned out

Mixed Media on paper, 20 x 20 cm “Forrest friends”

New starts – 100 artworks challenge

This and That

mixed-media I have decided to commit myself to a long-term project this year. To dive deeper into and develop my style and to share my process and thoughts about what is going on both creatively and personally when I am creating this way. I’m thinking a lot about how, what and why I paint and I really want to explore that further.

The inspiration

Over the last years I have seen how several of the artists, I follow, has carried out various artsy challenges – 365 faces, drawing-a-day etc. I am deeply impressed by the commitment they put into it, and the development which obviously happens through such a process.

And every time I thought that I could never do that. I am simply too restless and impatient to keep up the interest on a single subject, the same material and the same size for a long time. Always new ideas and techniques to try out … often before I finish what I’m currently doing. It often results in projects being shelved just before they are finished and I jump around among a lot of fun projects, but without focus and direction.

The answer

But then I came across Kellee Wynne Conrad’s challenge #100artworkschallenge and I thought: That I could probably do. 100 sounds doable and there’s no deadline (I like that!).

Still, I had to spend a long time considering which topic, media and size I could keep the interest on through 100 works.

The commitment

I pretty quickly decided on Mixed media. That way I get to play with a lot of materials in different ways. Kellee recommends small sizes and I already have a stack of 20×20 cm canvases lying around, so that choice was easy. You’re supposed to use the same substrate, but I give myself permission to break the rules, so I’m starting out on paper and will save the canvases for later.

The subject … now that was really difficult to decide on. It should be both challenging, fun, and somewhere I can express myself and my style. I looked at a LOT of collages/mixed media works on Pinterest etc. and although I love the variety and enjoy a wide range of styles, the works I always get back to features humans (or human-like creatures) and some kind of story, I can relate to. So that (pretty wide defininition) will be my choice of topic.

I will share my process here, but if you want to be sure to see all the artworks as they come to life, come follow me on instagram.

Ready, set, create!

Christmas cards: Finding inspiration

This and That

Since I opened my Etsy shop, I’ve been planning to make a set of Christmas cards. You just have to, when you’re a Christmas lover, like I am. But alas, the inspiration was far far away because I wanted to create something in my own style, something a little bit different from what you’re used to, but still very Christmassy. What to do?

I did do some sketches, but didn’t like them. I looked at all kinds of Christmas stuff on Pinterest to get an idea of what makes something look like Christmas – is it the color combinations or the motifs? I certainly didn’t feel like doing Santa’s in red or green Christmas trees.

I’ve always loved the graphic styles from the 50-70s, so I started a board of Christmas stuff from that time. And – hooray – christmas was in all colors back then; pink, orange, teal, brown, purple etc.

At the same time I did this grey and neon colored quote and I had a painted paper laying around, waiting for a quote. But then I saw a fox appearing from the marks. I started tracing it and more animals and trees came through. I filled the gaps with grey, outlined and doodled a little more. It was a lot of fun!

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The last doodles I did, was the snowflakes and there it was – my new Christmas style, yeah!

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Next step was painting a series of painted papers, making marks and finding the hidden Christmas motifs in them.

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Out of the 10 paintings I chose the 4 I liked the best. They were scanned so I could do the finishing touches on my computer to get the ready for print.