Inspiration, Getting from A to B, and The Couple's New House

The Couple
This is their house - on the back side of their cedar block
encaustic and oil on cedar block 6 1/4 x 11 x 5 1/2

 Remember The Couple from last week?  Well, they have a house now.... and a picket fence.

I decided to leave the sides with only the fence for fear things would get too complicated and busy
encaustic and oil on cedar block 6 1/4 x 11 x 5 1/2

Ever wonder how it works to get from A to B? How does the creative mind work to get from the concept at A to the finished piece at B? I thought for fun I would show you all the inspiration that went into how this 3D piece of art came about and some insight on how my creative brain gets from A to B.

I saw Kathy Taylor's 3D encaustic art blocks Here



Kathy Taylor Fine Art





My cedar block came from a friend's scrap pile.  I went to Home Depot and cruised the knob selection and landed on the silver knobs for the feet.  I had two critera - smallish and ones that would sit flat once attached to the bottom of the block.  The selection was a little slim - but I decided the silver ones would work.
 
Next came the power tools - the drill and also the dremel.  I had to sheer off the top (head) of the screws for the knobs so that I had just the threaded portion left.  I used the dremel for this, but a hack saw would also work.  I drilled 4 pilot holes into the base of the block and screwed in the threaded screws leaving enough of the screw exposed to then screw the knobs on flush to the wood. Taped them for protection, then started adding the wax coating to the block.

Next, I needed a subject for my 3D block.  I tried a few horses a la Kathy Taylor, but they weren't working for me.  So, I turned to some other inspiration.

In my studio, I keep the art of others that I find inspirational.  Diane Culhane, a local Seattle artist, is one artist that I have a couple of her paintings.  She tends to add cute little couples in her artwork.  I have this painting of Diane's which put me on to the tangent of painting a couple.

Artwork by Diane Culhane

The Couple then, just sprouted from my imagination.  I set in their shapes and just painted from there.  But, I'm not well versed in painting men, so I searched Google images and found this couple for inspiration.  I really liked his suit and the 60's vibe.  Although, my guy looks a little like Mr. Bates on Downton Abbey.

More about them Here

Then, I needed a house - so, once again I turned to Diane's work - my other painting of hers has this darling red house (and a cute little couple). 

Artwork by Diane Culhane

Plus, I found this house in the newspaper the morning I was going to launch my house artwork for The Couple. 

Photo by J.D. Pooley

I still needed a little more house inspiration so I also found this house

Artwork by Warren Kimble

and this one

Artwork by Michael Holland

The picket fence also needed a quick reference to Google Images.  I searched on white house picket fence and found exactly what I needed.  I also remembered that David Hockney had a painting with a house in it - so I went on that tangent and oogled over Hockney's work on Google images.  Love his stuff and it was a fun distraction to spend some time enjoying it.

It's an interesting path getting from A to B.  Sometimes its straight forward and simple with one reference photo and other times, it takes a lot of little pieces to make the complete picture come together.  I'm curious to hear how you get from A to B.

Also, a big heartfelt thanks to all of my PPF friends and the lovely comments left on Eva and Kristin's site last week.  It makes me happy to have shared my story with you.  I'm away at my encaustic class this weekend - so please forgive me for not getting around to visit everyone this week.  Can't wait to tell you all about what I learned!!