Having a go at collage

OK, so I was all excited about finding the right technique, but being a realist, I didn't jump in immediately but got some 4" square canvasses to try it out.
The theme was to be: Kitchen. Maybe these little trials would make proper little artworks to give away or even to sell!

I printed some kitchen images from one of the Dover books. I cut them out, glued them on according to the instructions and played with some mediums ( should that be media???) and some paint.
The result is awful!
But it shouldn't be surprise. I didn't quite follow the instructions.  This seems to be an ongoing issue with me! LOL The book suggests liquid acrylics, I used watered-down tube acrylics. I didn't want to have to purchase a whole lot of new materials when I haven't even used much of the ones I have!

Not only does the book suggest liquid acrylics, everything is identified by the brand name. I am not sure you can get that brand here, but the obstacle remains: I have dozens of tubes of cheap-brand acrylics I would like to use.

Anyway: I can still paint some more over it, the ugliness is partly due to the revolting colours!
I might glue some more stuff over it and I probably need to be more aware of composition. And improve on the colour scheme!

If everything fails.....follow instructions

While I will definitely do Joan of Arc in collage, I also want to develop my realistic drawing skills.
When I whinged to Deb it wasn't happening, she asked: " Are you measuring???"
I had to say "no" and I really wasn't doing any of the other things.
So yesterday I decided to allow myself the time to set up properly: floor easel, a masking tape line on the floor so I measure from the same distance. Object set up against a black cloth.
I am attempting to draw a simple narrow necked vase and I did it all: measure, draw guidelines, then do the curves, then finetune. Once I had one half I liked, to used the tracing paper technique we learned to create a fresh, symmetrical drawing.
Today I am going to put a light on the vase and start creating some form.

Re JoA: I bought different mediums and some small canvas panels to practice the collage technique on.

That great moment

My Tarot series took decades to actually come to fruition.
The next series is "uppity women": in chronological order (but not in the order I'll create them): Hildegard of Bingen, Joan of Arc, Elizabeth I, Catherine the Great.
I expect this series will not take quite as long because I'd be in my nineties!
I made a start on Joan of Arc, but got a major block caused by a lack of knowledge of materials and techniques. I created a collaged background and then painted a portrait of Joan over that. Later on I wanted to add flames and a lily. But the result was pretty awful: the collages were too dark, where the portrait covered some of the collages, those papers soaked up the paint creating a hard edges corner in the middle of Joan's face!

But today I suddenly had this great moment: a feeling of absolute clarity of where I want to go with this after a long period of indecisiveness, prevarication, frustration and uncertainty.
I was re-reading the Ann Baldwin book I mentioned earlier and I really like her style, so I decided to follow her instructions. It means starting from scratch, I don't think I can fix the earlier work, but I might go a bit larger as well. I will not paint the portrait, I will not paint the lily but work with paper collages. Even to the extend where I will scan in the lily I did in my visual diary last december and use that, rather than actually painting it on the canvas. I will however paint the flames, even maybe using a modelling paste.
When I think back of all the technical errors I made, I really did learn a lot from my mistakes.
I don't think I will use my newly acquired drawing skills (basic as they still are...) that may be for another time.