My Latest Art Project

I started another craft project based off of someone else’s blog post. Again, I didn’t EXACTLY follow their directions and my project suffered for it. Sigh. So I just had to share this debacle.

I saw a do-it-yourself art project online and decided to try it. All you needed was paint chips = free, and giant sheet of plywood or MDF = inexpensive, Mod Podge or other water downed craft glue = inexpensive, and a stain of some sort = free in my case cuz I had some laying around in the garage. So, it caught my eye because it was so cheap. I also thought I could make it cheaper by NOT using the sheet of plywood. I mean, come on. Why hang a hugely heavy sheet of wood like that when a canvas would – should – work just as well. So I thought. And I just so happened to have a giant canvas from another art project I was bored with. I thought, why not repurpose this canvas for this art project and save some money and recycle all at once?

Yeah, that’s what I thought.

So I went out and bought Mod Podge, something I had never used before, and I went to Home Depot for the paint chips. I got primarily fall colors to match the décor in my family room. I had the perfect wall to hang this on too. So I wanted specific colors. I also got the paint chips that were one solid color, not the two or three on one chip. Just solid colors. Then I went home and started cutting off the paint color names printed on the chips. Next I laid out a “design” with the colors, changing one here or there until I got what I liked. Or close enough.

Then I took my oversized canvas and painted the edges a dark neutral color that would come close to matching the stain I planned to use.

Next I glued the squares down and then covered the top layer with Mod Podge.

This would help seal the project and add texture to the top, giving something for the stain to grab.

In this shot you can see the brush strokes added by the Mod Podge.

Once the Mod Podge was dried, I added the stain.

I really liked the stain because it helped cover some minor flaws, like gaps between paint chips or bubbles in the chips from where the Mod Podge had gotten the paper too wet. It also darkened the vibrant colors of the paint chips. I liked it a lot. But I wanted to add another layer of texture if possible.

I achieved this by rubbing off the stain, once if was sort of dried, in a circular motion. This gave a whole different look to the overall project and I was pretty happy with it.

Here’s where I messed up though. Because the chips were glued down to fabric, it wasn't sticking very well. The corners kept curling up. And this was the one part I deviated from the original instruction. I glued them down to canvas fabric and not wood, which is totally flat and hard. Apparently the canvas fabric was flexing/moving too much. So the surface is not totally flat. I'm ok with the results, and will totally live with it, but if you want to do this on your own, I recommend you follow all of the original directions. The original post I saw, you can find here.

Here's my final product:

I'll post a shot of the art hanging on the wall as soon as I hang it!!

UPDATE:

Finally got it hung.

This is a large piece, about 5 feet long. Even still, it looks too small for the wall. Lee has talked me into make two smaller, identical pieces to flank it on either side, creating a triptych. I think that will fill in the space nicely and create a little more drama.

Now we just have to wait to see how long that will take me to do!!