How to Begin Talking (through art) about African Animals
But back to my photos and getting home. I started looking through the pictures and chose to use one of my favorite elephant shots. As we were driving through an animal reserve, this lovely beast suddenly appeared out of the brush a few feet from our car, eating away at the thorny 10 foot tall bushes. I took my pens to the paper and drew her then decided that the bushy brush was an important element to the scene and pulled out my collage containers. Pasting down collage papers really finished this piece for me, conveying the African brush pretty well. Next I drew a small portrait of a giraffe sticking her head out of more brush. These animals are really gigantic, and often have to lean down to eat--even the ten feet tall brush.
Both of these pieces have sold |
On to Menucha
Besides the opportunity to teach and work with art, Menucha sits on the cliffs of the Columbia Gorge offering spectacular views of the river, the gorge and the city lights of Portland to the west.
My Own "How To" Comes to the Rescue
Once I settled in back home I had the three fighting zebras to frame. Somehow the mat, frame and plexiglass I typically use didn't seem to fit these pieces, so I ordered cradle boards to mount them on. I haven't done this for some time, so I went back to the "Step-by-step" blog I posted in 2013. https://margaretgodfreyart.blogspot.com/search?q=cradle (My own posts can be so handy in such a situation.)
Here are steps #1 and #2. Tomorrow I will paint the cradle edges and move on from there.