Feng Shui Art Canvases

My mother turned 82 Saturday. 82! And she still teaches 3 step aerobic classes a week. Not ‘senior’ step classes – full blown, get your pulse pounding, aerobics. I know. I’ve been taking them from her since last summer and I still have to modify my moves.

I generally make or paint something for her birthday. Since she loves asian decor, anything feng shui works really well. Little did I know that this one simple project would light the path for the rest of my work. But more on that later.

I started with 4” square canvases I ordered from Joanne.com with a 40% coupon.

Since they came in a set of 9, I knew I could make a set with all the elements of the bagua.

I’ve been dying to do some mixed media work with ModPodge. I found some asian scrapbook paper at BigLots for a couple bucks (which I didn’t take a pic of). I sorted thru all of it, trying to find the right colors & shapes to correspond with the bagua.

First I basecoated the sides of the canvases with Raw Sienna, then topcoated with a couple coats of Bronze. Just to match some accents in Mom’s interior.

Then I cut the papers & decoupaged them on each square. Once this was done they looked, well, just okay. They needed something else.

So I googled ‘chinese characters’ for the words I wanted, took a bronze felt pen, and drew them on.

I also took some fine tip Sharpies & shaded the characters a bit.

You could print the characters & words off and then transfer them, if you don’t trust your freehand skills. But I kind of wanted a ‘rough’ look. The felt pens worked great! I’m so glad I didn’t try to paint them. It would’ve taken a couple coats and it’s much harder to get clean edges. So I’m loving my felt pens more and more!

We still haven’t decided where they’ll go in Mom’s house. Right now they’re on her mantle. But they’re supposed to be positioned in the shape of the bagua.

What do you think? Mom loved ‘em so much she wants me to do some larger. Which takes me to another entire blog post – about the new direction of my artwork.

For now, I’m linking up to these great parties. Can’t wait to see what everyone’s up to for spring!

Colleen