Thursday, July 14, 2011

A Tale of Royal Joy–Share the Joy Thursday

Our joy story begins with a happy Queen of Arts with the full day in front of her to create !

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In the morning of her special day, the Queen played with spray inks, Golden fluid acrylics, plain old craft paint, stencils, sponges and paintbrushes.

And lo and behold :

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Two square 6X6 canvases with awesome backgrounds appeared before her !

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The Queen was thrilled beyond belief that her playtime had been so fruitful after a dry spell of well over a month!

After the morning arty play time, the Queen returned to her duties of fulfilling the needs of her Royally Cute Subject as well as her own heart,

and took a walk…

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After a lunch of an exotic, rare Montreal bagel that the Queen received recently as a gift, with light cream cheese, tomato and turkey breast,

the Joyous Queen returned to the studio to continue her artistic pursuits.

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“This square shall be the one.” she declared.

And with some well-loved Royal tunes filling the space and with the castle windows opened wide for fresh air,

the Queen set about creating her piece for this special day.

She drew a figure on to a page of an old dictionary,

painted it with Twinkling H2Os and Inktense watercolor pencils.

She outlined in India Ink Faber Castell artist pens and white Gel pens from Sakura.

The figure turned out to be an angel with her hand outstretched.

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It was cut out, glued onto the perfect canvas background and coated with a light coat of semi-gloss gel medium.

This all but ruined the entire thing as the details of the figure smeared with the gel medium !

The Queen lost it momentarily as she had worked on the figure for two hours !!!!

But then she gave into the process, let the gel medium dry and added some details on top to “fix” the angel figure.

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Then came the decision about what the angel would be holding.

“A heart ?” thought the Queen.

“No, too cliché and simple here.”

Out of nowhere, like many brilliant Artist thoughts, the perfect idea came to the Queen.

“A stack of rocks, just like my Father used to carefully pile here and there on his journey through life !” rejoiced the Queen, “And I am a Rock Fairy after all !”

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The Queen cut her rocks from the old dictionary pages, looking for just the right spots to feature on their surface.

“This looks awesome.” thought her Rocking Majesty,

“but it needs a word somewhere…”

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The word “Balance.” came to the Queen’s Libra mind.

Could it be possible that the word would be at the top of the page in her dictionary, and therefore be just the font and boldness that she needed ?

The dictionary was French. The French word for balance is “equilibre”. But alas, the word did not appear on the top of the page.

The Queen looked to her old, 1920’s English dictionary for help.

Instead of balance, she looked up “equilibrium” – a richer word somehow, in the Queen’s Artist mind.

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And there at the top of the page, in the perfect font and bold type was the word the Queen needed !

“A gift from the Arty Gods !” thought the happy Artist Queen, “The piece is complete !”

She glued the word in place, signed her Royal signature to it,

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and happily headed out to get Chinese food for supper, as the best place in the realm does not deliver.

The next morning, puffy from the salt and MSG in the Chinese food,

our Queen decided to tell her story and even add a final step to her creation.

She added the balanced piece to a bedhead Royal self-portrait, where she is really very happy

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though she looks a little vacant and grumpy (and definitely puffy !) in the shot.

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Balancing “Equilibrium” on her hand was a pretty cool idea though, don’t ya think ?

And this brings us to the end of our long-winded tale.

The Queen went on to drink lots of water to get rid of the puffiness, to avoid Chinese food again for a good long while,

and to live joyously every after in this very moment !

The End

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for more share the joy stories, head over to visit Meri and the joy-filled gang.

Big Love !

23 comments:

Anonymous said...

Those blocks came out looking gorgeous!!! I have had that smear thing happen to me many times. You know how I avoid it? I make sure to give the piece a couple of coats of medium in between adding another step, whether it being gluing something onto it, or using another color which I DON'T want to bleed into it. Then, if the addition does bleed, you can easily wipe it off with a wet paper towel. It comes off perfectly CLEAN, not having affected the already sealed part AT ALL! Works like a charm every time. I've even been able to scrub mistakes off a sealed underlayer.

I LOVED being taken through your gorgeous day and the sequence of events! You are beautiful, at all times of the day, you lovely, rockin' Queen of Art! I didn't get to have Chinese dinner at the same time as you, after all, because I saw your post late last night, before bed. I was going to order tonight. But I will think of you, still, while I am eating it - there is no space and time in the imagination and we'll still be eating dinner together! Have another WONDERFUL and ARTFUL day! XO

Meri said...

Oh my gosh, Kim -- I'm absolutely in stitches over how grumpy and disgusted you look holding your treasure. It's so charming -- and your dry spell is ended. So why the "if you take my picture, you're dead to me" look?

Kate Robertson said...

Kim,

What a lovely post, I felt Like I was there with you every step of the way. I love the angel holding the rocks and the word too. So perfect!... I hope you have another lovely day. You make me want to paint again, but alas until I get my weaving room all painted and put back together, there is not time for art. But soon, I hope.

Kate

The Bodhi Chicklet said...

Ha! Ha! Ha! What a great narrative, right down to the grumpy, puffy Queen. I think you should have worn your tiara for that shot though. And a beautiful piece of art - I see you come by your heritage as rock fairy honestly. And there are never mistakes in art, are there? Do you use the actual dictionary pages or do you scan them and use the printed page? Inquiring minds want to know!

Kathy said...

Thank you Kim.. for the lovely walk thru your day and your creative burst.. lol I have the same reaction to chinese food but it is sooooo worth it... absolutely perfect piece of art and fab word for it.. I had the same thing happen with my journal pages.. sigh... Wishing you another brilliant day of art in your realm...
xx

rebecca said...

you have so generously rocked my world!

i love you dear girl.

i love what comes through you and how in the

Queendom of Kim

there is always royal sharing and spirit lifting going on!!

xoxoxoxxxo

Dawn Elliott said...

I felt pure joy as I read the incredibly cute narration of your day. Your piece is totally awesome and made me wonder why you had such a long dry spell? What great writing, with wit and humor - I loved it!

Unknown said...

oh you do look sad in your pic...but I can tell by the story that you are anything but. The cairn of rocks is the perfect gift for this lovely queen!!

Mary said...

i just gotta say i love this piece and you!!

you rock!!!! :)

Unknown said...

You have totally, 100%, completely, and utterly inspired my socks off right now. And I LOVE the piece so very much- how magificent!!

couragetocreatewriteandlove said...

can i say that i am loving the pictures, too you are so good and love you being so hilarious too!
yes i do love the zen like of the stones
bravo!

Sherry said...

Orange right off the bat!!! Love that!! And I think Equilibrium works better than Balance -- it has so much more "depth". The choice of rocks vs. hearts was brilliant!

and oh that Chinese food...we love it but it does not love us...puffiness always results!! Good for you on the water to cleanse and I'm happy to see that Her Majesty is enjoying her alone/creative time!

Olivia said...

I too loved being part of your dat, my Queen...whenever you share your process with us, I learn so much. I need to do a post on this. I especially appreciate how you integrate words with your art. This one, particularly, as it was so enhanced by the "mistake"...

I too have troubles with MSG and occasionally get ambushed by some in food, so I feel for you.

as always, thank you for letting us into your life.

XoO

lynne h said...

i LOVE this long winded tale!! and i love this painting...

okay, that's all then... just checkin' to make sure the Queen is being Queenly - and holding to the Joy thread...

xoxo

LuLu Kellogg said...

What a fabulous piece of art! I love love love the colors you used in this!

Paint on beautiful one!

Love,
LuLu~*xoxo

BJ Lantz said...

I enjoyed my vicarious visit to your lovely little realm ~ and especially adore that stack of rocks for some reason... Welcome back to your creative rule!

XO

jgr said...

What a lovely tale, dear queen-I love the rocks!!
. . . And now I am very much craving Chinese food-LOL!

Julie Prichard said...

Hooray!!! Welcome back to art!

Eydie Kugler said...

HI,
This is my first time visiting your blog.
It is so inspiring and joyful.
Loved the balanced stones.
Thanks for a beautiful visit.
xoxo

Cindy said...

I love what you did, very creative gal, and I love the fact that she is holding the rocks. being a rock lover like yourself. Chinese food does the same thing to me too...I guess one way to drink lots of water.

patti said...

Gorgeous mix of words and art! Love the balancing rocks, it's so you!

beth said...

your art is amazing and now you're a story teller, too....how many talents can hide in that heart of yours?

and i learned along time ago, no msg for me. it caused my migraines to explode. and oh the puffiness :(

xo

Elena said...

LoveLoveLove this post and artwork and puffy queen.