Painter Girl

Getting a Little Inspiration

Over the Fourth of July weekend, while visiting with family in the Berkshires, I also visited the Clark Museum and Mass MoCa.  The Clark is located in Williamstown, MA and is small but wonderful museum housing an impressive collection of  French Impressionist works as well as European and American paintings.  I was there to view the current exhibit, Dove/O'Keeffe: Circles of Influence.  This is quite an impressive display of works by both Georgia O'Keeffe and Arthur Dove.  O'Keeffe was greatly influenced by Dove's work and they maintained a lifelong respect and friendship.  I was not familiar with Arthur Dove, but found several inspiring ideas for wall finishes in his work.   This exhibit runs through September 7th.

Next, I headed over to my favorite museum, Mass MoCA in North Adams, MA.  This is a huge museum devoted to contemporary art and always a lot of fun to visit.  Since I am out in this area often to visit my mother, I am a frequent visitor here as well.  The museum is quickly expanding and I found myself getting lost as connectors led me from one enormous building to the next. 

While I loved every exhibit here, the one that really spoke to me was Sol LeWitt: A Wall Drawing Retrospective.   This link will give you a wealth of information about the exhibit, Sol LeWitt, and the process of creating this installation.  Here are a few photos I took while there.  I think you can see why I could easily relate to this exhibit!

The shear size of these painted walls and the enormous size of the rooms in this converted mill complex make quite an impression.  There is also a great little cafe, Lickity Splits located just beyond a fantastic museum store on the ground level.  It's also my sole source for internet access while out visiting my Mom

Window Design Job Completed

Well, as predicted, this WAS one very fun job!  I had some company visiting this week and it was also my daughter's 24th birthday, so I had no spare minutes to post here until now.  I did, however, take some photos during the process.

One of the first pieces of this project to be completed was this mini mural.  This was created to insert behind a real window in the store front, so it looks like the pets are inside the house, looking out.

Here you can see what I am talking about.  You are also seeing part of a fourth of July banner in front of the window.  The dog was free handed, but the cat is an old stencil I had on hand designed by Kari Butler.  The pattern on the curtain is a scroll repeat design by Royal Design Studios.

Under this window, I painted some bushes, using sea sponges.

I stenciled in some shutters, using another  stencil from Andrea Designs, I've had for years.   You can also see a close up of the painted wooden slats. 

There is a full sized door that leads into this little store front window area.  The problem was that the floor for the window area is raised up about 3 feet from the actual floor in the building.  I painted the real door knob black to blend in with the door, added the trompe l'oeil door knob and mail slot, as well as some panel detailing on what once was a plain door.

I forgot to take some shots of the faux step you can barely see in front of the door.  This was a plain box made of wood that I painted to look like a granite step. 

A closer look at the door knob and keyhole.

To give this door a little more height inside this store front area, I added a row of window panes above and to the right of the right of the door. To the far right you can see the large store front window.

Another view of the glass surrounding the door.

The mail slot.

The glare was too distracting to shoot pictures from the outside looking in, so I had to shoot my pictures from within.  Here you can see the completed shutters around the real window, a real trellis leaning against painted clapboards,  indoor/outdoor carpeting for grass with a picnic scene set up. 

The stone walkway was done as a floor cloth in my studio and taped down into place  I cut the grass rug out around the path.  A carpenter created a miniature sign post to hold the For Sale/Sold sign and a local newspaper is thrown on the walkway.

I am going to pick up a few more props for this window over the weekend and will return on Monday to further decorate. 

Everyone here at Prudential Realty were so supportive and enthusiastic of this project.  This store front is on a very busy main street in the center of town.  By changing out the props each month and keeping it interesting and fresh, I hope the window will bring some welcomed attention to this business.

Window Design Fun

Today I am starting what I think will be one very fun assignment!  This photo to the right is looking a bit reflective because if you look closely, you can faintly see me snapping the picture.  I am standing in front of my latest project, a store front window, looking in at the current display.  This window belongs to Prudential Realty in Needham center.  They have hired me to give the window a new look.  The bedroom vignette that you are now seeing, will be gone. 

I will be painting these blue walls to look like facade of a traditional New England cape.  The space is quite small, maybe 8' wide by 4' deep,  7' high.  The weather has been on the cool side here with lots of rain for 2 weeks now.  I almost hate to say this, but I'm hoping it stays cool and cloudy for the next few days while I am working in this small, glassed in spaced!  Stay tuned this week to see the transformation. 

Good Triumphs Evil This Week

Ah, here we are at the end of the week and I see that I have not posted one post until today.  Well, here's how my week went and I am hoping you will understand why I could not focus on blogging this week:

Over the weekend my Business Account which I hold at Sovereign Bank was hacked into.  Now I did not lose my debit/Visa card...someone just hacked into the system and stole my number.  Several charges, in the thousands of dollars were made to my account.  This activity started Saturday afternoon and by early Sunday morning Sovereign was onto this, calling to alert me.  They froze my account to stop the activity.  I spent a some time at my local Sovereign branch, receiving excellent support and opening a new account.  I had to meet with them the next day also to file paperwork disputing charges that were not mine.  By Thursday, all the money that was once in my account was returned by the bank, and my new account is up and running.  I also was reminded that this bank allows small business owners who have accounts at this branch to set up a display table to promote our business.  I will rework some of the display boards I have in my studio, order some new postcards and be the featured business of the month for August. :-)

With my Business Account frozen, this left me scrambling for some cash to put into the New Business Account!  The Contractor from Hell whom I had the displeasure to work with during the month of May still had not paid me.  He was now 3 weeks overdue with this payment and I was sick of listening to his untruthful story lines.  I had already warned him that I would be phone the client directly for my payment and that is exactly what I did.  They already had a heads up about the situation so were more than happy to write me a check.  They told me they were so pleased with my work and the way their new media room turned out that they would be having me back soon for a few other projects...sans this contractor.  Another happy ending to a stressful situation for me.

Now with some money in my new account, I was ready to concentrate on generating a little more income to keep things rolling along.  Last week I was practicing my sad hockey skills with my bf one morning at this great new rink we found.  After our skate, I noted that ALL the walls in this huge 2 rink arena were stark white cinder blocks.  I could envision these walls with life sized silhouetted hockey and figure skater images, some done in solid colors other with a patterned overlay. There is a Party Room for kids birthday parties which would be perfect for large silhouette animals on skates.  As I left, I got the owner's contact information, sent him an email with a few ideas attached, and sat down with him 2 days later for a consultation.  My proposal is now in, so I'll report back whether or not this is a go as soon as I hear.  It definitely would be nice to be painting in a nice, cool ice rink during the heat of July or August!  Plus,  I could skate too! 

End Tables Finished

This week has been spent catching up on some much needed office work, doing a quick touch up, one consultation and completing this furniture project:

I left off a few posts ago, showing this before shot.  I have 2 of these identical tables to transform.

Everything primed and ready to go!

Completed and delivered!

 I used a scroll all over repeat design from Royal Design Studios on the top, painted the legs and some trim a solid grey tone and did a soft multi color stipple on the raised top row of panels.  There is also some metallic silver brushed into the recessed grooves on the trim work.   A fun project and the room is now much lighter looking with the dark wooded painted.

Completion of Condo Job

I tried to get a few more shots of the flowers that I painted on the walls in the Living Room when I was finishing up last Friday.  The room is small, the lighting poor, plus it was a dark, rainy day, so the shots are not great.

You can't see the details on the flowers, but you can see the placement.  The ceiling slopes in on 2 sides in part of the Living Room.

In the small galley Kitchen I painted this little garden mural.  I used an assortment of stencils for all of it, just adding some free hand embellishments here and there.

This shot shows the shading a little clearer.  The picket fence stencil is a free stencil I picked up at some convention years ago.  I know that ivy is from Royal Designs Studio as well as the Daisies, but I think the Tulips are from Andrea Designs.  The ferns are from Royal Designs.  I meant to write down who's stencils I used, but instead I forgot and put them back in my studio.  I typically write my blog posts very late at night, so no energy left to run down to my basement studio!

This was a fun, relaxing job.  A nice change of pace from the previous job!  I hope to be doing some painting in this client's two granddaughter's's bedrooms soon!

Furniture Repair

Today I thought I would just show the process I used for repairing the two pieces of furniture for my client.  They are minor repairs that I was able to do while here working on the Living Room and galley Kitchen.  This piece, a deacon's bench, had been chewed by a dog.  I sanded and plastered.

I lucked out and was able to find a base paint that was a very close match and felt I was almost done with the repair after applying 2 coats!

It's hard to see in this final picture, but I did add a little, very fine graining in a deeper brown.  Unfortunately, I was not thinking I needed a high gloss sealer and only had a matte sealer with me for the 2nd piece of furniture.  I applied this, but will see if the carpenter who is doing some other work at this home will add a little high gloss poly to this corner.

 

Next, I tackled the cabinet that had the burn mark and finish that was worn off when someone tried to make the burn mark disappear.  In this photo, I have already sanded the area, filled the burn hole and put on two thin layers of a pale yellow base paint.

The top of this cabinet has some hand painted flowering vines in each of the 4 corners.  The left hand corner was damaged from cleaning with a solvent and from the cigarette burn repair.

I thought I would just trace one of the other corners that was in tact, flip the tracing paper over and transfer into the opposite corner.

This is the corner I traced.  But, then I decided the design was so simple, that it would just be easier for me to flip my traced corner vine over and copy it vs. doing a tracing.

That seemed to work well for me.

I added a few more dark blue tones and highlights, then sealed with a matte sealer.

Living Room Project Continues

 Now I have added the final details to the flower groupings... a little darker blue and some green stems.  There is too much furniture all pushed together in the middle of this small room to get a good, full room shot at this point.  I will try to get some finished room shots on my last day, when I can put some of the furniture back.

While I am here, I am also going to repair two pieces of furniture that have been damaged.  This first piece, a bench, had been chewed by a dog the homeowner used to have.  I sanded the chewed corner and then filled in with some wood filler and have left it to dry for now.

This cupboard was a piece the homeowner bought quite a few years ago.  I don't know where she got it, but it is all hand painted and quite pretty.  Unfortunately, her late husband was a smoker and left his cigarette on the top one day. :-(

Someone took some type of cleaning solution to the top and took off some of the finish, so now it has the burn mark as well as the finish wiped offed in this one corner.

So far, I have just sanded the burn mark and filled it in.  More later.  I have a small garden mural to do in the galley kitchen here and then I will be done.

Living Room Project

I am well underway with this Living Room Project.  Here are two "Before" shots showing just the plain, pale yellow walls.  It's a small, one bedroom condo in a Fifty-Five Plus condo complex.  The homeowner has not moved in yet, but most of her furnishings are here.

My client sent me this piece of wallpaper and asked me if I could copy the flowers and paint them randomly scattered on the walls in her Living Room.  I took the wallpaper to Staples and enlarged the two groupings of flowers on a copier.  

I then cut a silhouette stencil for each of the groupings:
 

Using this stencil, I went around the room and just roller stenciled, in white.

So far, so good.  The only glitch was the fact that I forgot my good glasses and had to resort to digging in my backpack for a back up pair.  Sad to say, this was all I could find.  Luckily, I had on my baseball cap and that helped to keep them in place!

Next, I went around with an angle brush and just painted in this medium blue tone, looking at the wallpaper for guidance.  

And this is when I had a little accident with the blue paint.  I don't know why I am such a klutz these days, but I have spilled more paint this year than in all previous 12 years of painting - total!  I was working from a small sample sized paint jar, maybe 4 oz. of paint in the jar.
As I moved the ladder, the leg caught a bit on my drop cloth and the jar flew off, right onto my chest!  Some paint hit the wall, but 99% of it hit me and the steps of my ladder. 
Here you can see my shirt lying on a drop cloth.  Note all the blue paint on both sleeves.  My sleeves were so heavy with paint, that I had to take my shirt off and put on a sweater I had in my backpack.  When I took my shirt off, my arms were also a light blue from the paint seeping through my shirt!  I looked like a Smurf.  Remember those???  My bib overalls also took some of the paint.  Here's a shot of them, with me now in the sweater:

I wasted about 45 minutes cleaning myself and my mess up, but in the end, I did remain pretty much on schedule for the day!  I really need to order some new overalls....

Furniture Fun

I haven't done a piece of furniture in a while now and had forgotten how much I really do enjoy doing the occasional piece for a client.  My studio is really too small to do a lot of furniture, so I limit the amount and size of the pieces.

I picked up this coffee table and 2 large end tables from my client.  I forgot to take the "Before" shot of the coffee table, so you see it all finished here.  When I deliver the end tables I will get some better shots.  The rug in the photo, will be replaced, so the colors of the table did not need to co-exist with this red rug. 

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The middle panel... the marble, is real.  It drops into a recessed frame.  I have a soft limestone glaze on most of the piece, which is not showing up in the photo.  The 2 panels on either side of the marble are done with Royal Designs Scroll All Over stencil, as well as the raised panels on the sides of the table.  I outlined these 2 panels with a very tiny scroll border from Laser Excel Stencils.

I currently have the two end tables in my studio.  Here is the "Before" shot.  I primed them both out with Stix.  This is a great, oil based primer that sticks to slick or glossy surfaces.  I lightly sanded the furniture before applying.

I now have both tables sanded and primed.  These two tables will be in the same room as the coffee table, so I will be using some of the same finishes and stencils, but have decided to bring in a medium toned gray.  Stay tuned.

Tomorrow I start a new job.  I will be doing some stenciling in a living room and a small garden mural in a galley kitchen, plus repairing some damaged painted furniture, so I'll just be visiting these end tables for quick coats of the base color before or after work for the remainder of the week.