New Work: Ice Cream Social 1, 2 and 3

Ice Cream Social 1
16" x 16" painted papers collage on paper

Ice Cream Social 2
16" x 16" painted papers collage on paper

Ice Cream Social 3
16" x 16" painted papers collage on paper

When I was a kid, we had a great ice cream shop that was just about a mile from my house. Duffy's was a true neighborhood/corner shop and a kid could walk there and have a great time selecting flavors. I have fond memories of their strawberry sherbet, banana, and mint chip ice creams. There was also blue colored bubblegum ice cream (actual bubble gum balls embedded in the ice cream), rocky road (my dad's favorite), and regular chocolate chip (not as good as the mint chip in my opinion!). Store bought ice cream was also an option. Neapolitan in a carton was a favorite as I recall. In those days, nobody thought twice about ice cream and it's delectable whole milk fat! Now, well, when is the last time I had straight up full fat anything? Not recently that is for sure.

Anyway, the above three pieces were inspired by my memories of going to Duffy's to get ice cream. It's a little ironic that my first steady paying job was at Baskin and Robbins. Maybe I have always had a thing for ice cream!

What's new with the above pieces is the mono prints. In the second piece, I did some "pressed paint" mono prints onto that pink paper. In the third piece, I actually made two collographs using cardboard, tinfoil and glue.  The glue produced some great results. It does need to be sealed with matte medium or something water resistant prior to pulling a print. (All collographs need to be sealed with something.)  I used some gesture sketches to create a design in glue on the sealed cardboard. Once the glue dried, I re sealed it with matte medium and then painted it with paint. I pressed my paper onto it and then used a brayer to strengthen the image. You can see the lines of the cardboard. That was an unexpected surprise. For the other squares, any variations in the paint are caused by the brush and the matte medium to paint ratio. 

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In other news, I wrote a little blog post on hiking tips for beginners. It is published here, in Forest Living California online magazine/site. Please feel free to pass along the link provided to anyone who may be interested in hiking as well as others who may be interested in life in the foothills of California. John and Arlene have an excellent web presence and a "magazine" that offers lots of resources. 

OK, hope everyone is having a good week. Thanks for reading and commenting.

Libby