THE MAGIC BLUE FOAM!

Yesterday the weather was gorgeous and my two friends and I had a date to go see the Frida Kahlo exhibit in San Francisco. We drove to the subway station and took BART into the City, had lunch at the Nordstrom complex (can't remember what they call the new expanded shopping center, I just know how to get there!) and then we walked a few blocks to The Museum of Modern Art...and read the sign that said "Closed on Wednesday" AAAARGH! You would have thought at least one of us would have checked this little detail. The Museum Store was open and doing a brisk business with all of the other clueless folks who came to see the show. Naturally, we did a little shopping. I controlled myself and only bought one big book and one little one. With no car, I had to carry everything for a few hours. By the time I got home, the day was gone and no painting.


Today, I had critique group in the morning, then a trip to the art supply store and then a hair cut and then to the shoe store to check out the tread on the exercise shoes. I found some fun stuff at the art supply store, one being a flexible masking tape about 1/8" thin that can create curves. I'm going to try that on my next painting. I also bought a small pad of YUPO to try things out on before I work on the large sheets. Again, not enough time to paint but I did do a little experimenting after dinner.


I got this idea in my head that all the exercise shoes have different patterns of tread on the bottom and that some of them would make good stamps. I have these neat little magic blue foam rectangles called PenScore Magic Stamp Moldable Foam. (That is what you Google to find a supplier). You heat the surface with a hair dryer or, better yet, a heat gun (for stripping paint) and then press it into any surface that will give an impression. If you want to "erase" your impression, just reheat it and start over.



Here are my little experiments I did this evening with a photo of one of the foam blocks with the impression. I used my new YUPO pad. I know they work with stamp ink, so tonight I tried brushing some watercolor over the block and stamping it. Them I wanted to see if Caran d'ache watercolor crayon would work. The turquoise and yellow green are from the crayon. It worked better than I thought. I am very excited about the patterns. I have a few blocks left, so I will return the 3 pairs of shoes and get a few more to work with. It doesn't harm the shoe in the least. The bigger the shoe, the more area to print.