I am painting treasure chests – sea chests to go with my seascapes for the exhibition in April.
Here is the first one….
It is a lovely old pine box that was painted in horrible black gloss paint, and had obviously spent it’s life in a shed somewhere.
I have let some of the age and history of the box shine through – the old pine and the black paint, by knocking back my painting and giving it an aged look in keeping with its age, but more importantly hopefully I have given it a whole new lease of life and it can continue gathering a history and not end up thrown into the dump or burnt, which may well have been its fate otherwise.
I like the idea of drawing with sand paper on painted wood, a bit like drawing with and eraser on pencil on paper.
I am using Danish painted furniture, antique sea chests and retro sailor tattoos as the inspiration for the imagery.
Am looking forward to setting up some photos of the treasure chests together when the oil paintings are properly dry.
I still want to ‘weather beat’ the inside of the box, but am loving the red.