Word to Your Mother

or, to be more precise, MY mother...

Mother's Garden Club 20" X 24" mixed media for Take a Word

You can see some of the papers covered with words in this detail:



This is what I painted for my mother's Christmas present. I photocopied memorabilia from her desk, remnants of programs and bulletins from her mother's garden club days, ticket stubs, invitations, newspaper clippings and collaged those onto the canvas as the base for the background. I then brushed on shades of parchment and linen acrylic paint which I layered with ink, oil pastel, and charcoal. Between the layers I used an acrylic sealer, so I could mix oil and water based media. The vase of flowers came next, and, finally, the lemon. This will hang over the fireplace that she just had built in her newly renovated den. I was still working on it at 11:30 Christmas Eve, but it was dry and ready to gift wrap the next morning. She was really excited about it when she opened it and I was thrilled to have created something that made my mother so happy because she was the one, after all, who bought me my first set of paints when I was five. And I have to hand it to her, she was a pretty good sport about the masterpiece I created on the living room wall with that paint.