Mural art

As I realised I wasn't getting anywhere with my art projects mainly because I didn't know (still don't know) much, I decided to take professional help. I was buying and storing a lot of art and craft material but wasn't using any or experimenting with it because I was scared I would waste material and money. So I finally enrolled for some classes and took up a murals class.

Here I learnt to work with ceramic powder, dental powder and air dry clay. These are used for creating different shapes and textures based on your design. I was very happy with all that I learnt and completed two murals.

The wisdom tree

The mural titled "The Wisdom Tree" was my best project. It took me 10 hours to complete just the leaves. That is mould the ceramic paste into a leaf shape then texture the leaf and paste it. Now while it looked beautiful I had the task of painting it and I love painting, so I thought it would be cakewalk and here is the end result:

I somehow wasn't satisfied with the end result and the paint just doesn't do justice to the work put into the artwork. Here is the second mural, as this was in the workshop from start to finish I only have the completed picture.

I do like this one just that they both have too much in it. This is a mural with a pot (of butter) the weird rod is actually a rod like kitchen accessory used to churn the buttermilk to get butter. then their is a peacock feather and a flute. The feather and the flute are the identity of Lord Krishna in Hindu religion and He loved cream. So the mural basically combines three of His favourite things and well the blue at the bottom is water (no idea about that, I just bought the already cut wooden base.)But if I had to make a story it would be that it depicts the river Yamuna on whose banks Lord Krishna's grew up.

Again the Pictures don't do complete justice to the artwork, however do let me know if you like it.
Thanks for reading.

My first art work

To start off my creative journey with embroidery I went and shopped around for stuff that was easily available and things or material I knew names of and how it worked or how to use it . I bought lots of embroidery thread, printed fabric for beginners, a little more advanced design printed on fabric for painting and embroidery.

I made a draft piece of fabric to practise different stitches that I am trying to master. My first completed art work is a cross stitch design. It took way too long and however long you work it seems you have barely done anything. Although I must admit completing the project gave me so much joy and satisfaction it was totally worth it. I was doubting myself that I might leave it incomplete and its not my cup of tea but it so totally is, my confidence is at an all time high. Here is the picture

cross-stitch project

The other designs I tried with different stitches. I used mainly chain stitch in this project ,a little bit of back stitch and in the centre of the design I have used a herringbone stitch. The embroidery in its many stages:

Its unfinished because I ran out of embroidery thread but I plan to complete soon.
For the second project I used satin stitch for the design below:

 Oops ran out of thread here too.. :/

 Again I used satin stitch for the yellow flowers but I used two shades of yellow.(Its barely showing in the pictures)

 Now for the pink motif I used a weave stitch in the centre and then satin stitch again.

 For the final motif, I did it with a long and short stitch. I completed it in two parts the centre part was done first, although I did think of doing a different stitch for the outside but nothing came to mind so I completed it with the same long and short stitch just with a different thread colour.

The most difficult part I found was deciding the stitches to do for every motif. As a learner I was aware of only a few stitches to begin with and even though I searched the net endlessly and found beautiful embroidery work and amazing blogs with tutorials but I couldn't figure out if the particular stitch I liked would look good on my embroidery pattern. So I just did what i thought looks good, hope all the potential readers also agree.
Please do leave your feedback , good or bad I appreciate it as it will give me a different perspective at my creations.
P.S Sorry for the bad pictures I am working on my photography skills and on getting a better camera than my trusted phone.

The dream in transit

The creative dream has been in transit since its inception. I wanted to do a lot and start creating amazing artwork however reality has kept me away. Of course I did a few project from Pinterest but didn't get instant success.So here are a few pictures of my "DIY" project that went wrong.
The recycled newspaper basket weaving project.

This project was going great till I reached the end when the rim went completely haywire and I got an unequal finish to the top.

I was doing this other project, its a haldi-kumkum box (turmeric & vermilion box an Indian traditional requisite) Most Indian women keep silver or brass containers for the same but I came across some wooden ones intricately decorated and decided to do some myself as a trial.
I had a brilliant idea for the design so I sourced the material and applied a generous coat of white primer to the wooden containers. Someone suggested that I use acrylic colours and I did however once the paint dried it just started to peel off.  Here are the pics..

But c'est la vie and life goes on so I am removing the entire paint off with sand paper and going to start all over again.