Creation from Destruction

nmdart.com

Here is my newly finished studio sign. I really love the way it turned out.

As many of my projects, it was months in the creation, though actual time spent is far, far less. I probably put about two hours into making and assembling the components.

It all started when our household (and studio-hold) goods arrived in Florida summer 2015. I had a pair of tables from my grandparents' house. They have continually lost more and more of the decorative skirt that made me so fond of them. This move, however, resulted in the top cracked through and a broken leg.

Here is a photo of the remaining one, which is in better shape, (ha ha).

Being a packrat, I decided to disassemble the broken table. I'm saving the pieces of the skirt. Eventually, I'll use them to make one whole skirt on the remaining table. I think the turned spool legs will make nice candlesticks. That left me with the top. I thought it would make a great sign.

Previously, I have applied vinyl lettering to my studio wall. Considering the number of places that I have had a studio, it makes considerably more sense to have a portable sign. I could even take it to shows if that becomes a need!

Materials:

Table top (or similar box-shaped crate/drawer)

Table leg or newel

paint

foil or tin

two eye hooks

two hooks

two D-rings

picture-hanging wire

rubber tubing (I used 1/4")

wooden skewers or dowels that will fit in tubing

hot glue gun

glue sticks

scissors

vinyl lettering or more paint

First, I painted the table top and leg with some chalk paint that I had. My favorite watercolor brushes have a red stripe, so I accented it with red. I used heavy duty aluminum foil to make the ferrule, but I wish I had purchased some tin. (I may redo this part at some point.)

I attached the hooks into the bottom hanging edge of the "sign" and the eye-hooks into the brush handle.

I put D-rings on the back and ran picture-hanging wire across so that the sign will hang flat against the wall.

Now, to make the brush tip!

The end of the table leg I used already had a hole, so I used a dowel to give the bristles a starting place and stability:

I cut the tubing into the desired lengths. (I started at about 14", but by the end of the project, I liked the bristles closer to 9," so I wasted a lot of tubing.)

I applied hot glue to my barbecue skewers (cut in half) and pushed the into the tubing until the ends were flush. Then, I glued them to each other around the center dowel/tube shown above.

 I just went around and around until the whole square leg would be covered. I trimmed the "bristles" at an angle and shaped them into the round brush shape that I desired and then hot-glued the whole brush tip into/onto the leg.

I applied my name in vinyl lettering to the sign portion (from Single Stone Studios on Etsy) and put it onto the wall.

It's fun and quirky; I love it!

Copycat...?

Do you love Pinterest? I do. Do you look at artwork on Pinterest and get inspired? I do.

Recently, however, I noticed that some inspiring pins are ending up as finished paintings with eerily few innovations or changes. An internal debate began about whether this is copyright infringement, or merely an easy way to nail down a composition that you find pleasing so that you can get to the painting part. A little research revealed that it might or might not be illegal, depending on whether the new work is the same size, whether the copied painting has been copyrighted, and whether there have been "enough" changes to declare it original.

As I'm considering all of this, it dawns on me that I am not squeaky clean and above reproach either. Last year I did three paintings that might fall into this realm.

1. My painting, Extra Vivid, was inspired by the "pin" that follows it:

Are these two paintings identical? Would you say that mine is a rip off of their technique? I think that there are enough differences in these two that I am safe from legal prosecution. (I don't think I even looked at the inspiration painting after I got my paints out.)

2. The second one is a bit stickier of a situation. Verdant Hillside was inspired by the one following it as well. Is it too much like the inspiration to be original? I would love your opinion.

3. My painting, After the Rain, was based on the blue boat. Your thoughts?

What conclusions have I come to? In all three of these cases, I used a crutch because I didn't know what I wanted to paint and it was easier to scroll my Pinterest inspiration boards and copy something than start from scratch. I think all three are a bit mine, but this isn't the way that I want to choose my subjects in the future.

My Pinterest boards should be more about "This is a color palette that I want to try." or "I want to have more aggressive brush strokes like this artist." I have plenty of my own photos to use as inspirational subjects. Then, I also have memories and stories for the resulting painting. Bonus! I am going to stick with that moving forward.

I think the best test might be if you put the shoe on the other foot and think if your painting came first, and you found their pin on Pinterest, would you consider the inspiration piece a copy of yours? Therein, lies the truth.

(BTW, I'm currently reading The Art Forger. I am REALLY enjoying it and that is probably the reason that I have this subject on the brain.)