Color Inspiration~

I have skeins of Malabrigo hanging by my studio window.
Right outside the window is my planter, with geraniums, salvia and nasturtium in the exact same delicious colors.

Garnet & Molly

 

 

Lettuce & Apple Green

Go here to buy!

Painted Tool Bags

I finally finished a project that I can share with you!

yay me.

Introducing... my painted tool bags!

TOTAL COLOR CONTAMINATION.

I went all the way with the reenie palette on these,
because since they are for ME to use.

Materials:

~ Tool totes or bags from your local home improvement store.

(I chose more of a tote since they will live in my studio most of the time)

~ Heavy bodied gesso-- meaning a thicker brand.

~ Acrylic paints and brushes
~ Sharpie water based paint markers

~ Oil pastels

~ Clear coat spray paint

Here is what they looked like before....
They were a divine red and black.
Came with removable shoulder straps...
and have pockets all around the front and all around the inside edges (not shown here).

I gave them both two coats of gesso-- they really drank it up!

At first I gessoed them to give myself a white ground to work on, to make the colors pop!

I did not think they needed the gesso, but once I started applying it I realized they really did. 

The vinyl fabric would have devoured my precious paints.

It's taken me a month-ish to get them finished, been dabbling at them when I get some time.

Close ups of the "Tool Bag",  the one I will keep my hand tools in.

MORE close ups in my flickr album HERE or see slide show below.

Close ups of the "Painting & Travel Bag"~

MORE close ups in my flickr album HERE or see slide show below.

Inspired by my friend Michelle and her bag painting ventures.

Many more images of my bags here in my Flickr Album...

Kapow!

reenieout

Color Passion

Artist~ Wesh Yu 

I had an epiphany the other night. A realization of sorts...
Nothing uber- profound, just a sampling of my brains wanderings.
It's amazing what your brain can do at 4 am. How in tune you are with your instincts and intuitions.
During the day I confuse the Bleep out of myself sometimes. But in the middle of the night? I make perfect sense.

So this realization was that for my art and creativity? It is mostly all about the colors. The content and mediums count too of course, but I start with the colors. I feel the colors. I am one with the colors.

When I was in the depths of my spinning phase I would collect words or phrases that spoke to me, associate them with a color scheme, and create a palette from fiber and spin away.
That transitioned into finding color inspirations everywhere.
The energy of colors and the moods they create when they play off one another? sigh.
Even the 'ugly' colors (not that there are any ugly colors, but there are some I do not gravitate towards.) have been appealing to me lately. I normally am not drawn to muddy colors, more to the BRIGHT and VIBRANT... if you haven't noticed. (smile)

The other day I came across a blog called Color Collective. This brilliant woman, named Lauren Willhite, is taking images from design, fashion and art that inspire her and blogs them with a color palette.
Oh MY!
This is exactly how my brain works when I see an image I respond to, only much more translatable.

While paging through her delicious blog, I realized that I have this yarn palette, right here on my stock shelves, in the form of Malabrigo Yarn~ ! (perhaps next I will do this with rovings)

So I just had to connect some of them to share with you.
Super yummy-delicious.

Artist~ Robert Kauffman (fabric)

Artist~ Pretty Little Thieves 

Artist~ Anna Kern 

Links in this post~

Color Collective 

Material Whirled's Malabrigo Yarn Page 

Wesh Yu

Robert Kaufman

Pretty Little Thieves

Anna Kern