Harvinaisen Kaunis Elämä: Finnabair Art Recipe June 2021

I had started this canvas months and months ago, when I had wanted to give my subconscious a voice to be heard. I mean, sometimes it is quite nice to start a project without having a single thought in your head. Just let your hands pick up materials and have a go. This canvas was the result of those mindful, quiet moments of creativity.

I had an empty 30x30cm canvas I picked as the base and started to glue wrinkled cardboard (from a cardboard package) and Moda Tissue Paper randomly on it, using Soft Matte Gel, primed the whole thing with white Heavy Gesso, and added some ornamental dimension in form of Iris Tapestry stencil and Icing Paste White Gold, with a slab of White Sand Texture Paste here and there. And on a whim, added a layer of Impasto Snow White on top of everything, to get a simple background where a hint of golden glimmer shined through.

Only then I started to think what to do with the canvas, and simply dived into my endless supply source of driftwood and seashells; our family has (or had, it’s covid time with no travelling right now) a habit to drag at least one luggage full of seashells, sea glass, and driftwood from our travels, so there is way, way more of those than I could ever use, which means, I always use them as part of my embellishments.

So, I attached the ones appealing to me right there and then, with Heavy Body Gel, one by one, together with a happy mixture of a broken gear (I had used the large Gear mould with air dry clay, and dropped and broke the largest gear, but it fitted in perfectly here), vintage clock hands, and Finnabair mechanical embellishments with some Melange Art Pebbles.

Then I painted most over with Heavy Gesso and added a mixture of gesso with Mini and Mega Art Stones here and there, to add more dimension. I still had no idea for the colouring but thought I’d start with Liquid Acrylics, my all-time favourites, thinking about a misty morning in an otherwise empty beach with no sound but those of gentle waves and of seagulls calling, and our family leaving foorprints in the low tide sand, breathing fresh air and memories on the making. With a mist sprayer in one and a brush in the other hand, I started applying colour into the canvas. Only a little, painting a distant echo of that misty morning of my dreams. I used Titanium White, Burnt Sienna, Ink Black, and Prussian Blue. At that point I wasn’t satisfied with the look, and thought I’d continue later.

And later it was, by some months, as I simply forgot the whole canvas… I digged it up for this Art Recipe, immediately realizing what was missing: some Gold Metallic Flakes and Light Patina Metallique acrylic paint. And indeed, it did not need anything else, but a softest touch of gold flakes resembling rising sun, and Light Patina blue – which I added only a little here and there, spraying a lot of water to make it blending into the canvas like morning mist gently rolling in the horizon. And the canvas will always remind me of that magical morning in a faraway beach, of the echo of seagulls, of five pair of footsteps in sand and of a happy, contented heart.

Emilia