DIY artwork

brummiebird443

HI, I was hoping someone could give me some advice. We've recently redecorated our lounge, the walls are a shade of white and i've painted the chimney breast a gorgeous chocolate shade and the rug is in various shades of chocolate and teal. We thought we'd have a go at doing up some artwork for the chimney breast to liven the room up a bit but the problem is we dont know where to start! I've located some canvas in a shop called "the works" and they also sell acrylic paints, but the problem is neither my husband or i can paint for toffee! we really havent a clue in terms of design/ pattern,.
I want to use shades of teal and brown, but just dont know where to start,
We'd really appreciate some help, thanks.

In_for_a_Bargain

There are quite a lot of those canvas prints about at the moment and I am pretty sure that I have seen some in the colours you mention. If you have a Home Bargain near you they definitely had some in. I would imagine Wilkinsons would too, maybe even places like Matalan. Even supermarkets have them in sometimes. Why paint them when you can buy them!!! Only saying that because I can't paint for toffee and that would be my option. Good Luck.

moanymoany

I've seen the guy on 'selling houses' make artwork. It seems to be two sorts.

The first is wallpaper that reflects the colours you have.

The second is to make blocks of your main colours with smaller blocks in the accent colours.

It always looks simple, but is effective. I've just made a collage for my landing. I had a boot sale book full of lovely arty photos of buildings with old painted signs, pictures of rooms from old French and Italian rooms and interiors. I was going to take it to a charity shop, bu I decided to use the pictures in the colour I was using and make a collage. I used an old frame for it and it looks very nice.

Use paint from your walls. You will only need to get cheapy trial pots of accent colours. You could try it out on a bit or cardboard and use lining paper for the proper one. It would look good in a clip frame. You could make different sizes and put them together. You could use main with a bit of accent and accent with a bit of main. Once you get going it will give you inspiration. Look at the selling houses website and google 'easy art' or something.

have a go, I bet they look great.

t_obermory

If you're not great with paint -not to sound patronising here- keep it as simple as possible or it'll look rubbish.

I'm with moanymoany if you want to use paint, use tester pots as they're cheaper than acrylic and for what you want do the same thing. Duck egg blue looks good against chocolate as an accent.

Again reiterating moanymoany try it on some lining paper first, I'd recommend using masking tape to get straight lines (pull away very gently though).

If paintings really not working go with the wallpaper, you don't need a lot and can probably get what you need as samples. Its quick, easy and very effective.

Hope that helps!

sandieb

http://www.grahambrown.com/us/store/diy_help_create_piece_art.html

Any good?

donny-gal

Have another look round The Works, I picked up a marked canvas (design drawn on it) complete with acrylics from there a short while ago. If you dont like the colours - these were shades of brown circles then you can just buy a differnt tube of paint.

DG

sandy2_2

You don't need canvass, you can use MDF although it is a bit heavier. Have you got any old pictures you can paint over?
If you´re looking for inspiration for some modern art, have a look on the ebay site. search for modern contempary art, acrylic, self representing artists
eg http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ACRYLIC-PAINTING-ON-FRAMED-CANVAS_W0QQitemZ280192556597QQihZ018QQcategoryZ60438QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Another easy thing to do is 4 canvasses of relatedtoning colours to give you a large block picture. Also have a look at this site
http://www.grahambrown.com/us/store/diy_help_create_piece_art.html

Have fun

squeaky

Paint? You don't need no steenkin' paint!



I picked up a really nice jigsaw with a leopard on it for 50p at Oxfam.

Then made it up with the intention of framing it "as is" - but it looked a bit sort of boring...

..so I took off the outside edges and the boring bits first and just left the eyecatching bits and then framed it.

I'm so pleased with it that I've been keeping my eyes open for other nice pictures and recently got a really nice tiger puzzle for 25p. (Can't you guess I like big cats? )

So that will be my next project.

I shan't by a nice new frame - I'll by a picture of (I don't care what as long as the frame is the right size) and use that

Pink.

Hi brummiebabe,

I've moved your thread over from the I wanna board and merged it with this one as Martin has asked that we don't post duplicate threads.

Pink

specialK

I would go with a squares or stripes theme, randomly using the browns and teals:

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Imagine each line to be a different shade and don't worry about clean lines, I think brush lines will look really effective.

karren

my mate painted a canvas cream then with light brown they all used thier hands and feet they dipped thier hands in and made a fantatic memory its really lovely and arty and cost pennies!