Hobbies: Acrylics – Buddha in the Making

Luckily for me, a close neighbour is an artist and has begun offering lessons. Delighted, I immediately enrolled and started this painting back in March.

After showing her some rough sketches, we laid down a textured surface on the canvas using a combination of Gesso and Crackle paste.

In the following lesson, after I’d sketched out Buddha and lotus flowers at home, I stared at the white canvas, paintbrush in hand, not knowing where to start. It reminded me of the blank page syndrome and overcoming the dreaded writer’s block. Who knew artists suffered the same problem? A blank canvas. The teacher, seeing my hesitation, suggested I mix some base colours and apply them in layers, making circular movements with the brush so the colour wasn’t ‘flat’.

Legend has it that Buddha’s hair was created from 108 snails, so I wanted to create a 3D effect. I rolled the string into circles, which I was going to glue and then paint.

Nope, it looked naff. I then added gold paint. Nope, that did not work either.

Unable to achieve the desired effect for the hair, I decided to take a break and moved on to the Lotus flowers. Scraped off layers of paint to reveal the canvas. Decided to use beads for the centre of the flowers. I stood back and admired my handiwork. Now I know food can talk, but this Buddha has very definite opinions because the following morning the glue had failed to set, and the beads were sliding northwards off the canvas.

After hours of painting, repainting and procrastination, I eventually resolved the issues with the hair, flowers, ears and toned down the background. The painting was a steep learning curve, and although still far from perfect, it will do.

Canvas size 60 x 60cm

Related Posts:

Stone Painting: Frog Lily Pad

Mosaic: Tree of Life or Thorn in My Side?