Dead Fly 99 - Froggy Does the World a Favor

 

Dead Fly 99 - Froggy Does the World a Favor

pencil on paper 8" x 10"

     I had hoped to do one more Dead Fly Froggy Christmas card this year to add to the collection and send out to family and friends, but actually I was kind of depressed this year when Christmas rolled around. I really don't think anyone felt all that great. Let's face it Covid and other happenings in our country and the world have taken their toll on our good humor. However, on New Years Eve morning this image came to mind! Yes! Thank you, Froggy! Let's all hope for a change for the good in 2021. Hoppy New Year!

Dead Fly 98 The Last Supper

Dead Fly 98 The Last Supper

oil on canvas 8" x 10"

     Here is a Dead Fly painting I did in early 2020 before Covid hit. I wanted this to be themed for the Lenten/Easter season. I had an image in my mind of the last supper and figured that in a natural setting there probably would have been flies in the room. At first I was going to do the usual golden chalice for the wine but after thinking about it figured Jesus wouldn't have had a gold jewel encrusted chalice. Although he was special I doubt they had really fancy dinner ware. It seemed glass would be a better choice. I also like to think of this painting as "what Jesus saw." You can interpret this however you please.

 

Dead Fly 97 - REAL Dead Fly Solarium

Dead Fly 97 - REAL Dead Fly

Solarium

Mixed media

approximately 10" by 5"

     A few months into the Dead Fly project back in 2017 I had the good fortune of finding a mummified Dead Fly in my kitchen sink. It was completely intact, wings still attached, legs up*. Perfect! I carefully set it in a little glass dish with cellophane over it and set it in a safe place for future use. Over the next couple years, periodically I would examine it and toy in my mind with how it would be memorialized and preserved for posterity. Eventually, this object d'art came to mind. I have always enjoyed working with miniatures and found this project to be quite involved and a lot of fun. 

     I got the dome from Michaels (art and craft supplies). The rug is a carefully cut out and fringed piece of tapestry I got from JoAnn Fabrics. The doily is a piece of lace cut out of a ribbon. The vase is a small ivory bead with painted weeds for the flowers with a bit of moss for the leaves. I made the table using balsa wood for the top and bits of stems from the trumpet vine that grows on our porch for the legs. A tiny bead is the drawer handle. The vase is a wooden peg which I then marbleized, an old technique used by master painters. The leaves are ribbon and wire, cut, painted and shaped. The floor boards are balsa wood scored with a knitting needle and wood grained, another old master painting technique. The Japanese screen was tricky to make but eventually came together - cardboard, paint, duct tape and velum on which is a rather whimsical painting of a Dead Fly with cherry blossoms around it.

     *As I said the project was tricky and rather delicate especially at one point when in the course of carting this project and the fly back and forth to my studio I accidentally broke off one of the legs! But a magnifying glass to assist and a pin and a drop of Super Glue saved the day! 

 

Dead Fly 96 Apparel

 

Dead Fly 96 Apparel

Acrylic stamp on white cotton

     All this stamping going on! Although I looked up how to do a silk screen, it really was beyond anything I could do, so as a way of creating some Dead Fly apparel, I stamped a white T shirt with a Dead Fly stamp from Dead Fly 94. Starving artist that I am, I hesitated to buy a brand new T shirt for this project and instead went to our local thrift shop to look for a suitable one at a price I could afford. The picture hardly shows off its true beauty so at some point I'll get someone to model it. It's a one of a kind. I don't have any intention of doing a bunch of them and starting a Dead Fly clothing line at this time. But I'll let you know if I change my mind.

 

Dead Fly 95 - Dead Fly Swatters

Dead Fly 95 

Dead Fly Swatters

approximately 18" long - acrylic on plastic

     Because an artist has to make money and until the series is complete and I have a show of all one hundred Dead Fly pieces, I decided to make up a bunch of Dead Fly Swatters for people who wanted to support this project and wish to have something to show for their support. They also work well to swat flies. It took me a while to find a place where I could get blank "promotional" swatters at a price I could afford. I found this at Windy City Novelties near Chicago. They even come individually wrapped in a cellophane bag which makes the sales look very professional. I was selling them at The Arts Underground (closed now forever on account of Covid) and will sell them for $5.00 a piece if I ever get to do an arts festival again. I would sell them mail-order but haven't found a cheap way to package them yet. If I ever do have the BIG show, they will be available for sale there. I have lots! Each one is individually hand stamped (I used the stamp used to create Dead Fly 46) signed and numbered.

 

Dead Fly 94 - Red on Red on Red

Dead Fly 94

Red on Red on Red on Red

acrylic on canvas 18" x 24"

     This one took a long time. I liked the way Dead Fly 46 (Splotch in Red) came out so I wanted to see what a similar piece would look like but bigger! I had to cut vinyl pieces for printing and then of course glue them to blocks so I could use them on the canvas, There's no going back once the stamping begins so the piece is quite random. It is what it is! 

 

Dead Fly 93 - Froggy Goes Holiday Shopping

Dead Fly 93 - Froggy Goes Holiday Shopping

Pencil on Paper approximately 8' x 10"

The third, well, fourth actually if you include the Thanksgiving card (#41), in a series of Holiday cards I make for my family and a few close friends, here we have Froggy out doing her holiday shopping. This as well as the others are now available as greeting cards and proudly displayed at The Arts Underground* in Lewisburg, PA on a rotating  card rack, an investment I made so as to get some money for the project till I have that big show and start selling off the individual pieces. To see the others in the card series go back to Dead Flies 41, 42, and 73.

*Unfortunately, The Arts Underground, the co-op of which I was a member, had to close down in April of 2020 due to Covid. We couldn't make rent and we couldn't be there. If I ever get a studio/selling place again, I'll let you know.

Dead Fly 92 - A Grand Experiment

Dead Fly 92 - A Grand Experiment

Acrylic and silicone on canvas 18" x 24"

I've been reading about pour paintings using silicone but have no idea how to do one. But I did have some extra packets of silicone laying around so one day slathered the canvas with it and then just started painting away. Sometimes the paint would sit on top of the silicone. Then it would sink to the bottom. It certainly didn't slow down the dry time, which I thought would happen. What was neat about it is that new colors layered over the old like glazes, but then dried so quickly that they could be blended. It's best to see this one up close and real to appreciate how the paint worked. 

Dead Fly 91 - Dead Fly on a Manila Folder

Dead Fly 91 - Dead Fly on a Manila Folder

Pencil on a manila folder

Harking back to the original dead fly which was on a manila folder, I created this piece of art using a manila folder and colored pencils. It took a long time and I have a stack of trial and error dead flies on manila folders that were all part of the process.

Dead Fly 90 - DIY Dead Fly Shadow

Dead Fly 90 - DIY Dead Fly Shadow

Mixed media on canvas 14" x 14"

Here is an experiment. Sometimes I see things in my mind and then just want to try them to see if they work out in reality. For this I made a base out of aluminum foil then stitched that to the canvas. Then I covered it with plaster tape even wrapping the wire legs. Then I filled in the gabs with caulking and after several days of drying time painted it. The canvas is painted "manila folder yellow" to recreate the first dead fly on the first manila folder. When it's hung, depending on the light source, the fly casts it's own shadow which changes because light changes.

Dead Fly 89 - The Executive

Dead Fly 89 - The Executive

Mixed media - 12" tall

This one was made using aluminum foil as the base, covered with Sculpey. The wings are made of copper wire twisted till it took shape. I tried again soldering them together buy need to learn a whole lot more about soldering before I'll ever be successful at it. The legs are pipe-cleaners, singed to make them look like fly legs, then covered with some Sculpey here and there. A quick trip to the thrift shop and I found a small lamp which I took apart for the base. This particular piece is sized right and would look great on an executive's desk. Hence the name - The Executive

Dead Fly 88 - Object D'Art

Dead Fly 88 - Object D'Art

mixed media 31" tall

Here is the first sculpture I've done for this series if you don't count the little flies in Dead Fly 45. I used a paper bag stuffed with newspaper, then covered with plaster tape for the body. Used wires coated with plaster tape for the legs. The wings were trick. I thought it would be easy to solder the wing wire together and after many failed attempts, just twisted the wires in place. Yes, that's an old lamp base for the base. I thing the design on it looks like fly wings. The whole thing was then painted with Rustoleum to make it look like iron. Originally I had in mind to do a model suitable for an executives desk but got carried away with this one and it ended up bigger than I thought it would which leads to...

Dead Fly 87 - Picnic

Dead Fly 87 - Picnic

acrylic on canvas - 14" x 14"

This one took a l-o-n-g time to do. I actually started this one a few months ago after I'd picked up a bunch of cheap acrylic paints from Michaels Art Store. I wanted to see what they painted like so went at it just kid of slapping the paint on the canvas using a picture I had in my mind. I wanted a dead fly on a picnic table. I painted in a glass of wine. Everything was all crooked as hell, but what the heck. Then came the struggle. I wanted clouds. Didn't know how to paint clouds so I went to YouTube and searched How To Paint Clouds. So many clouds! After much work this is what I came up with. The clouds looked good, The fly looked good. But the glass of wine looked like crap so eventually I gave up on it but had used so much paint in trying to get it right that the image was impasto. No amount of painting over it completely got rid of it so I decided to take sandpaper to the canvas and sand out the glass of wine. I was a little too over enthusiastic about this and went and sanded right through the canvas. Sigh! So much work and now I'd gone and wrecked the canvas. Well, I fixed it with a patch on the back and some plaster filler. You can still slightly see where the wine glass was, but it's not really obvious.

Dead Fly 86 - Self Portrait

Dead Fly 86 - Self Portrait

watercolor on canvas 14"x 14"

Unplanned subject, but I felt like doing a Dead Fly using just the black watercolor pencil. It started out as just a nice study of a Dead Fly in the middle of the canvas, then I added some water, then just let going. I had an original idea of doing one of those lovely little black and white studies of the subject but as I worked I started to see a face in the lines and shadows. Then I thought, Hm, that kind of looks likes me. So emphasized that area. Then saw another one, and another one, and another one... How many do you see? 

Dead Fly 85 Flying

Dead Fly 85 - Flying

watercolor on canvas 14' x 14"

Back to the watercolor pencils. I felt like just working with limited color to see what would happen. Like I said, at least I know what it will be a painting of.  It was tricky to add the yellow mustardy color to this one. One never knows what will happen when a new color is introduced. And like with all painting, you have to now when to let it go. Stop working on it. And say It's Done! After these watercolor paintings on canvas are thoroughly dry, I spray them with a quick coat of acrylic varnish.

Dead Fly 84 - We've Come to This

Dead Fly 84 - We've Come to This

acrylic on canvas with iron rust added

Six canvasses 14" x 14" each

This is my Fourth of July 2019 painting. I've been at this Dead Fly Project for a couple years now and each Fourth of July I wax patriotic and do a USA themed piece. This one took a while. First the layout. Then the painting. Then I carved the stars out of block vinyl for printing on the canvas. I carved six stars each one a little different and then as they were stamped onto the canvas, I took an extra slice out so that each one is different. Much like our own states. Each one has its own personality, problems, successes, political leanings. At this time I feel our country is falling apart. We're so divided. If we keep it up - well, Dead Fly. It's meant to be hung haphazardly like depicted. Troubled times. Even the stars lack order.

Dead Fly 83 - Experiment with Water Color

Dead Fly 83

watercolor on canvas 8"x 10"

I picked up a set of watercolor pencils and felt like trying them out.  One of the things that's fun about this Dead Fly Project is that when I do feel like experimenting with a new medium I don't sit there for an hour debating with myself about what I should paint. It's going to be a dead fly. So I just tarted drawing. Then brushing and spraying water on the canvas till it was done. I kind of like this medium. This one looks like stained glass. I like using it on canvas as well. That saves framing and matting which can be expensive when done properly.

Dead Fly 82 Modern Art Fly

Dead Fly 82 - Modern Art Fly

acrylic on canvas 14" x 14"

     I bought some really cheap acrylic paints from our local art store, Michael's, to be exact. Big tubes, six colors - red, yellow, blue, green, black, and white.With the 50% off coupon I paid $16.00. I wanted to see what they would do. So I figured I would just start painting lines, shapes, colors slapped on quickly until the painting no longer disturbed me. Figured I might as well work a dead fly into the mix as well and make it a part of the series. This one still disturbs me, but at a point you just have to call it a day and let them go. I don't think artist's are ever completely satisfied with anything they turn out. Joslyn says this is why when you go to an artist's studio there are so many paintings turned against the wall. On the other hand Greg - my husband who gets to see all the works in progress and beyond - when he overheard a phone discussion where I said I might just destroy this one - said -" I like it this one." I guess there's something for everyone.

Dead Fly 81 - Chaos

Dead Fly 81 - Chaos

acrylic on canvas 14" x 14"

     Still at it with the drips. I had a rather disturbing week and needed to work stuff out. Started with red paint on canvas - heavy coat with extender - dropped on some black - tried to make flies out of some of the drips and splotches. That dint work out. Decided to destroy the painting but not the canvas so took it outside and ran it under the spigot. At a point of all the heavy paint getting washed away the images started to take form and at which point I shut off the water and brought what was left inside to dry flat. Then played with it for a couple of days here and there till it looked done. I feel better for having painted this one. Thank you.

Dead Fly 80 - Swarm

Dead Fly 80 - Swarm

acrylic on canvas 8" x 10"

     This is another experiment using that same paint but this is a wet on wet. Slather a heavy coat of white paint on the canvas this time adding some extender, drop on some black using the same, then go at it with a pointy object to draw out the flies. My daughter has refined this technique to a fine point. She uses a steak knife. After watching her do this for several days I just wanted to try one myself. Hers are much better. It's kind of like Jackson Pollock. He had total control over his drips. Anyways it was fun to try.

Dead Fly 79 - Tumult

Dead Fly 79 - Tumult

acrylic on canvas 8"x 10"

     I am trying out some new paint here and deiced to play fast and loose with it. A splotch of watered down black paint on the canvas, step back, see if I can see the fly - then a few quick strokes to bring it into focus. Key here was Work quickly! Paint dries fast!

Dead Fly 78 - Goth Fly

Dead Fly 78 - Goth Fly

hand-cut silhouette on paper in pewter frame

     Early in the beginning of this Dead Fly series I found this picture frame at the thrift shop. It's a beauty! I have tried my hand at cutting silhouette profiles of people and actually have some success with it. I had always envisioned a hand cut silhouette of the dead fly in this frame with a deep red velveteen mat. More than just the fly, the entire piece was to become the work itself. I did find what I was looking for as far a mat - it's actually a double mat - plain black is used to define the edges. The red is red suede. I had the mats cut at Brushstrokes in Lewisburg, PA, where the man has an oval cutter. I love the way this one came out! The double mat cost an arm and a leg but I wanted it to look really good. It matches what I had in my mind. Absolutely beautiful!

Dead Fly 77 - Dead Fly with Red Apple

Dead Fly 77 - Dead Fly with Red Apple

pastel on paper 9" x 12"

     I actually used those pastel pencils to create this work. I used them for the fine detail. I still like the sticks better, though. The chalk goes on more like paint. This sat on the easel for a while with me going back and forth on the shadows. I could stand to try it again at some point. The apple at on the table long enough to rot. Had it been summer, I'm sure it would have attracted flies. As it was, I tossed the apple outside for the chickens to peck at and used my tiny fly sculpture for the stand-in model.

Dead Fly 76 - Dead Fly with Green Apple

Dead Fly 76 - Dead Fly with Green Apple

Pastel on paper 9"x 12"

     Still going with the pastels! Now that I broke them out I'm having fun with them. Here I went to the grocery store to buy just the right apples - brought a red one the same day - to just have fun working from life. Of course the fly is already dead. I had to use a standing for this sketch. It's a small model I made of the original dead fly which I use upon occasion when I need a model.

Dead Fly 75 - Study in Purple

Dead Fly 75 - Study in Purple

pastel on paper 9" x 12"

     Back to pastels. I do like pastels because they allow me to work fast - just throw on the color with no drying time between layers. This is the way I like to draw in pastel - those pastel pencils (see 69) Dead Fly seems pretty restrictive to my style. If you notice, in the bottom right corner you'll see different strokes of color. When I work with pastel, I use an area of the paper that won't show when the painting is framed as a pallet - to test the color as well as the hardness or softness of the stick I'm using and how it strikes the paper. This is important.

Dead Fly 74 - Circles

Dead Fly 74 - Circles

acrylic on canvas 16' x 20"

     This one sat on the easel for a while just sketched out in charcoal. I drew the circles and wanted to see where it would go once color was applied as well as legs.

Dead Fly 73 - Santa Visits The Froggy's

Dead Fly 73 - Santa Visits The Froggy's

pencil on paper reproduced to create a Christmas card

     The previous year (2017) I made up a Dead Fly Christmas card for certain friends and family and figured they'd be expecting on this year as well (2018)  I only print 24. Then I mail them out.

Dead Fly 72 - Ornament

Dead Fly 72 - Ornament

mixed media 3" diameter 

     It's hard to see the full beauty of this little gem given the reflections in the acrylic ball that the Dead Fly resides in. Had an idea to make a Dead Fly Ornament - or even a set of a dozen! and create this. The idea was in my mind but the original attempt at it didn't work out. I had tried to make it out of pipe cleaners then stuff it into the ball which only has a half inch opening at the top. The pipe cleaners got all smashed up and being pipe cleaners didn't spring back into shape. I needed something soft and pliable that could be squished through a tiny hole and open back up. I found an old Halloween costume head band in a dresser drawer here at the house. It was a spider. Then I cut off tow legs, pulled out a bunch if the stuffing, made some wings out of Contact paper (the frosted stuff) and Voila! It worked. Kind of like a ship in a bottle. Maybe.

Dead Fly 71 - Splat!

Dead Fly 71 - Splat!

acrylic on canvas 8" x 10"

     Here's an experiment in color and paint - and painting fast! Well, anyways, that's how it started out. Then I took a look at it. Back in art school I had a teacher who said we must be willing to destroy works that don't quite work out. Paint over the canvas. Burn them. Smash them. Stick them up in the attic where no one will did them till after your're dead. This one got set aside for a while. Then I figured I'd add more to it so this is where it went. No great shakes but it kind of looks like an egg splatted on the sidewalk to me. Another one that is what it is.

Dead Fly 70 - study in charcoal

Dead Fly 70 - charcoal study

charcoal on paper 8" x 10"

     Back to the basics once again. After the failure of the pastel pencil study I thought I best get back to an exercise in just plain drawing so I worked on this sketch in charcoal. I want to do some major works and needed to study the intricacies of the fly's wings - just in case I decide to get that detailed.

Dead Fly 69 - New Pencils

Dead Fly 69

New Pencils

pastel on paper 8"x 10"

     This one will most likely go on the wall of failures. I include it in this project because it's a fine example of "just because you did it, doesn't mean it's a great work of art." It's a small sketch I did with a new set of pastel pencils that I bought. I pretty much just wanted to give them a trial run. These pencils show up again in later works where I combine them with sticks of pastels that I am more used to working with. It is what it is.

Dead Fly 67 Dead Fly on the Manila Folder

Dead Fly 67

Dead Fly on the Manila Folder

acrylic on canvas 46"x 48"

     As I post this, this is still a work in progress. In other words, I'm not sure if I'm done with it yet. It's been tacked to the laundry room wall for a while and in between I've done other Dead Flies. I keep looking at it thinking it needs something but haven't gotten up the nerve to add more paint to it yet. Meanwhile every time I walk in the laundry room there it is glaring at me. Art can be very stressful at times. When I laid this one out I wanted to do an extra large painting because I think the big show I will one day have of all these one hundred dead flies, needs a few extra large pieces for balance and design. Most of the works are small because we don't have much storage space in the house. Believe me when I say it - the dead flies are starting to accumulate! And anyways, Greg, my husband, said when I started this project - "Well, I hope we don't end up with a hundred paintings stacked in the attic!" "Oh, no," I said. "I intend to sell them. But maybe I better work small just in case." Well, anyways, here's a big one, not stretched yet, so it can still be rolled up to save space.

Dead Fly 66 Splat!

Dead Fly 66

Splat!

acrylic on canvas 8"x 10"

     This one is off-center and would seem to be unbalanced but picture a flyswatter in a hand out of view but to the left and up. Disturbing to say the least but think of how the fly felt.

Dead Fly 65 Purple Paint

Dead Fly 65

Purple Paint

acrylic on canvas 8"x 10"

     Well, you can see I didn't rack my brain out trying to think of a title for this one! It's basically the three poses of the original dead fly worked very quickly in purple (some red) paint on a standard stretched canvas. They kind of come and go and rotate. This is another piece that can be flipped upside down or sideways and you get a different feeling when you do this. When I frame it, I'll probably add cross wires in the middle so it can be flipped and rotated according to the owner's mood. That's assuming somebody buys it.

Dead Fly 64 City-scape

Dead Fly 64

City-Scape

charcoal on canvas 8"x 10"

     Sometimes I go to Astoria, NY to visit my son. We walk over to Socrates Park - a sculpture park which is by the East River. In my mind's eye I could see a large dead fly floating in the sky with the city in the background. This was not sketched on location, but it was sketched out as I remembered it. It's charcoal on canvas, then sprayed with fixative so it doesn't smudge. I have to say here, that although I do like to work in pastel and charcoal, it's kind of expensive to frame those works. You need mats and glass. With a painting on stretched canvass you only need the frame - or nothing. I'm of limited income, so my art is somewhat dictated by that.

     

Dead Fly 63 Burning Fly

Dead Fly 63

Burning Fly

acrylic on canvas 8"x 10"

     I did this in the autumn of 2018 around the same time as we were having all those wild fires out west. Painted very quickly. I wanted to get heat in a painting. Very limited pallet. Red. Purple. Black. Yellow

Dead Fly 62 Labor Day

Dead Fly 62

Labor Day 2018

crayon on canvas 8"x 10"

     No great shake-up in the art world with this one. It is what it is. I wanted to try crayon and oil on a canvas and had one lying around so here it is. Basically I sketched out the fly, added the red and blue and rubbed it with a rag slightly damp with oil. I guess this could go in with the political flies when I have my big show.

Dead Fly 61 wet on wet again

Dead Fly 61

acrylic on canvas 8" x 8" (approximately)

     The fly is a little misshapen in this painting. Again, this was done the same afternoon and I had run out of canvas-boards and stretched canvasses. I found a scrap of canvas with my stuff and wanted to try another one. No touch-up in this one at all 0 just sprayed the scrap with water and quickly sketched out a dead fly. I let nature gravity and such, do the rest.

Dead Fly 60 Wet on wet continued in color

Dead Fly 60

Landscape with Dead Fly

acrylic on canvas 5"x 7"

     After trying my hand at black and white doing the wet on wet technique, I thought to try it with color and picked a simple landscape as the subject. It was handy to have a couple cheap canvas-boards to test this on. Remember, this is an experiment in art, so it helps to not treat every piece as sacred. Sometimes you just wing it and hope for the best.

Dead Fly 59 Wet on Wet

Dead Fly 59

Wet on Wet

acrylic on canvas-board 5" x 7"

     This is another experiment in what paint does. Another artist I know, has been working on a series of paintings using a flow technique. Wet paint on a wet canvas. I was at The Underground one Saturday afternoon and thought to try some of this. Although there is some control over hat the paint does when applied to a wet surface, there is not complete control. Shadows, shape, texture are at the mercy of the water. I did three that afternoon. This was the first one.

Dead Fly 58 Cubist Fly

Dead Fly 58

Cubist Fly

acrylic on canvas 16"x 20

     I tried my hand at cubism or at least what I think is cubism. Broke the fly down to basic angled shapes and painted translucent layers one on top of the other. Before I had added the rust color a friend of mine who is also an artist told me I should just paint over this one and consider it a failure. But time and energy put in to it already made me hesitant to abandon it. It needed the rust color. Also, he had seen it before the legs were added. I knew it was going to get legs.Can you see the Dead Fly?

Dead Fly 57 Still in troubled times

Dead Fly 57

Fourth of July 2018

acrylic on canvas board 5"x 7"

     The Fourth of July 2018 was a nice day weather wise as days go, but again, I worry about the state of affairs with the USA. I could have gone to see fireworks just across the road but last time I went people showed up in pick up trucks with confederate flags and MAGA bumper stickers and I just am not a part of that culture. I didn't even want to be near that sort of mentality so much as I love to see fireworks, I stayed home and painted this instead - because unless we become more civil and accepting as a people we're nothing but dead flies on a dark landscape.

Dead Fly 56 Sometimes you just paint!

Dead Fly 56

untitled

acrylic on canvas 24" x 24"

     This is one I started at The Arts Underground and finished at home. I just painted it - literally, not much thought - just kind of slapped colors on the canvas. It's fun to work with colors and see what they do. I like to see what one color next to the other does. All color is relative.

Dead Fly 55 Frenzy

Dead Fly 55

Frenzy

acrylic on canvas board 5"x 7"

     I find that there is a rhythm to the creation of these Dead Fly pieces, kind of like a heart beat. They go small, small, small, small, BIG, small small, small small, BIG... Almost like I warm up to the big projects by working on the small projects. This is a small one done quickly - I squeezed paint directly from the tube onto the canvas board. I like doing large complicated pieces but some of these little ones done on inexpensive canvas board allow me the freedom to fail. That's important with experimental art. At least if it doesn't work out I have broken the bank.

Dead Fly 54 Alive!

Dead Fly 54

Alive!

acrylic on canvas 36" x 48"

     There are two types of folk art that I really like. One is chainsaw art and the other is the freak show poster.  I have this vision of one day having a show of all hundred dead fly pieces and this will be the poster to coax people in to see the show.  It speaks for itself, but suffice it to say - I had a really good time doing this one!

Dead Fly 53 Unity

Dead Fly 53

Unity

water color on canvas-board 5" x 7"

     Ok. So First I wet the canvas, then started with a quick black on white dead fly water color sketch, then thought it needed something else so added the blue. Maybe thought it would be a sky. Maybe turn it into a landscape. Then added the red and thought, well, here I go again with another political fly - it being the colors of our USA flag. Then added a shadow and saw it turned purple. And thought, now we've got purple instead of just red and blue - GOP and Dems - that's how we see it sometimes in the USA. They call purple the unity color - would be nice - but probably won't see it any time soon.  So there you have it. Dead Fly Unity.

Dead Fly 52 Skeletal

Dead Fly 52

Skeletal

white pencil on card-stock 5"x 7"

     I tried the white ink on card stock again but worked a little bigger this time. Go back and look at Dead Fly 48. I could put a little more detail in this one because it's not "life size" like Dead Fly 48. It has a lacy effect, almost skeletal in appearance.

Dead Fly 51 Purple Ink Splotch

Dead Fly 51

Purple Ink Splotch

ink on paper 9"x 12"

     Those stamps that I carved for Dead Fly 31 (Dead Fly Flag) are fun to play with. Here I just stamped a piece of paper a few times to see what would happen. Looking at this one and the Dead Fly 46 - the red one - I think I may like to do this or one similar but bigger. Maybe go 16" x 20 acrylic on canvas, or even bigger! It's kind of cool - it looks like a fly, it doesn't, then it does again. I'll have to see... maybe I'll just do a bigger block print. Not sure.

Dead Fly 50 Nightglow

Dead Fly 50

Nightglow

acrylic on canvas board 5"x 7"

     Here's another little study just to see how it would work out. It's a small painting done fairly quickly - I used a hair dryer to dry between the layers - to see if I could make a dead fly light up against a dark background.