Le Cadeau du Cheval mural mosaic panel complete.

My Le Cadeau du Cheval mural mosaic panel is finished, but not without a major disaster! And it was going so well up until a few days ago…

When I paint something fussy like this in acrylics, I use isolation layers. What that means is that I seal the paint with a clear acrylic fluid every so often so any mistakes I make on top of that layer can be “erased. ” Acrylics dry fast and aren’t really erasable, but when dry they can be dissolved with rubbing alcohol. The problem is, without an isoloation layer, the paint will dissolve all the way to the support and lift off, leaving nothing but a gaping white hole.  The good news is that an isolation layer isn’t dissolved by alcohol. If I make a mistake, all I have to do is scrub some rubbing alcohol on it and wipe it off with a paper towel, leaving the paint under the isolation layer intact. It’s like having one level of “undo” while painting.

Well, after several isolation layers, the paint had gotten far too glossy, and I was afraid there’d be so much glare that no one would be able to see it in the mural. So the plan was to take down the gloss at the end with some spray-on matte varnish.

Usually that works great, but this time it went horribly wrong. Maybe it was the humidity that day. The spray went on like white powder, obscuring all the nice dark areas in the painting. Yuck! Immediately I ran to computer to pull up the the Golden site for advice. Unfortunately the answer was to consult with a professional conservator (not an option), but it did say that mineral spirits would dissolve the varnish. That’s not good news for me, with my intolerance of all solvents, but I dove in with a lint-free rag anyway. I’ll be paying for that for a few days. The varnish came off, but left cloudy swirls and puckered paint in some areas. Oh, $#!+!!!

So I let it dry thoroughly, sanded down the puckered paint, repainted those areas, then applied a couple of layers of acrylic varnish to get rid of the white swirls and sanding marks. The painting is too shiny once again, but it’s better than the cloudy mess it was before. Unfortunately, lots of detail got foggy in the process, and some contrast was lost. With the mural deadline looming, there wasn’t time to redo it all. I wish I had six levels of undo instead of just one, because I’d undo this painting all the way back to the beginning of last week if I could.

For better or worse, it’s done. This was a good challenge for me, trying to make someone else’s colors and pattern fit into my own style. The hardest part (other than dealing with rogue varnish) was creating the warm light/cool shadow pattern on a horse I photographed in full light. That’s a lot harder than it looks, and it took a few adjustments to get it to read right.

Before and after. In the mural, this will be the horse’s upper front leg.

Thanks again to the Mural Mosaic creators Lewis Lavoie, Phil Alain, and Paul Lavoie. These guys have been great to work with. They couldn’t have made it any easier or more fun for the participants.

Keep an eye on the Le Cadeau du Cheval “The Horse Gift” website as more panels are added leading up to the grand unveiling at Spruce Meadows in early September. Can you see the master image yet?

©Copyright 2008 by Tami O. See original post here.
To learn more about this artist, visit Tami O’s website.