Cinderella Fleeing From the Ball

Here is my new mixed-media painting, "Cinderella Fleeing from the Ball." I had a ton of fun with this one! It was sort of an experiment in adding more paper and mixed-media elements to my work and getting a little bit out of my comfort zone.



I covered the entire canvas with vintage sheet music, and added tissue paper to the edges (as well as using it for Cinderella's dress). I covered the tissue paper with acrylic washes, and added some fine blue glitter to her dress. I cut her face, arms and hair out of cardstock and added her features with colored pencil and acrylic. Then I added a paper butterfly and shoe.

For this one I was hugely influenced by Vanessa Valencia's work. Wednesday morning I came across this January/February 2008 issue of Somerset Studio magazine where I first came across her beautiful paintings. Reading the article again, I instantly started cutting and gluing! Of course my work could never scome close to her's, but it's fun to try! :) I did mine with some Fair Rosamund tweaks to make it my own. Her blog was the first I started reading, and her shop introduced me to Etsy. Ever since then she has been a huge influence on me, as she is for many people. And I was thrilled to learn that she lives in Arizona, like me! I'm sure that many of you follow her fantastic blog, but if not check her out at www.vanessavalencia.com.

I am working on a different Snow White painting today, which I will share with you soon. A foot injury I got while running last week has slowed me down considerably, but the up side is that its forcing me to really slow down and take my time with my paintings. I've been spending 2 or 3 days at a time just deciding on the right little embellishments to add.

Its so hard to choose, isn't it? I hope that you are looking forward to a nice Friday evening and a wonderful weekend! :)