Curiosity

Story Summary

Curiosity emerged as a full-on experiment, a playful pour painting inspired by watching a how-to video and encouragement from a friend. With no fixed plan, only willingness to try, this creation captures the spirit of learning through doing and letting paint, gravity, and time collaborate. The story behind it invites you to treat life as a series of experiments, releasing the need to “get it right” and instead honoring the discoveries that surface along the way.

Story

This was a complete experiment, which is why I called it Curiosity. I was experimenting with a whole new strategy with pours and didn’t think it would turn out as something that I would display. I watched a video on how to do a pour, thanks to my friend Cathy who was a fellow artist and shared the pouring videos. I added the pouring gel on the canvas and then poured the paint over the pouring medium. I began using some of the strategies that they showed in the videos, blowing on the paint to spread it, then I pulled out the hairdryer...nothing was working. After I saw the same strategies they were using, I realized the videos I watched all started at step 2, AFTER the paints had been mixed. I skipped step 1 and didn’t mix the paints WITH the pouring gel. I added them separately and tried to get the same result. I had already started so I needed to ad-lib. I decided to add more paint and use my paintbrush to spread the paint around to cover the canvas. As I kept working the colors, the texture and colors came together in a way I hadn’t quite imagined. There are even a couple parts that are purple and I don’t even remember using that color at all, the colors that came together must have met in a way to create the beautiful different highlights. For the being an experiment and after making my “mistake” I think the colors turned out well together and I love the texture formed. I decided I would display this even though I normally tell a story underneath. This was before I really started making sure every piece of art had a story underneath it that I could explain that informed the piece. In this case the mixed colors poured out tell the story of how I had my “wires crossed” in terms of how to do a pour. It is a great lesson though. Stick with it and even our seeming mistakes can turn into something different and better than we imagined. One friend even said “you simply created a new way of using it (the mixed media.)” Here’s to curiosity and learning and building off our “mistakes.”

view available prints